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NEW RELIGION 



R GOSPEL OF LOVE. 



BY E. ^^^r. GI^AY. 



"From the nature of the case all questions remain open, and must so remain. 
Each mind has its individual and indefensible rights. * * There can be no 
authority until the authority has been established in the individual reason. The 
only service one generation can do to another is to hand over its best thoughts to 
its successor. . Bishop Foster. 



CHICAGO:! 
The Thorne Publishi 

167 Adams Stro 
1890. 







3-^ 






Copyright 1890. 
By E. W. gray. 



All Rights Reserved. 



DEDfCATUON. 



The* following pages are respectfully dedicated by the author 
to the lovers of truth who have found it difficult to accept Chris- 
tianity as it is usually delfvered from the pulpit. 



PREFACE. 



The attentive reader will easily discern one purpose 
running through this book — it need not be here 
indicated. 

That human nature is imperfect — at least less 
perfect than it is capable of becoming under favoring 
conditions, is conceded by the philosopher, and 
assumed in all Law and all Religion. 

Whether such imperfection be but the proof of 
incomplete development, as the evolutionist would 
teach, or the result of some ^^lapse" from original 
perfection, as others hold, it is evident that the 
reformer of whatever name, should do his utmost 
to ascertain both the nature and extent of the infirmity 
he seeks to cure, before commencing his medication. 
There should be diagnosis. 

All Religions seek to bring men to ideal perfection 
— seek to qualify them for dwelling with the eternal. 
Religion, therefore, is the reformer of highest preten- 
sions. There are Religions, old and new, but their 
success as reformers has not been reassuring. 

Religion is so sacred that men hesitate to question 
its competency and pretensions. They have hardly 



Viii PREFACE. 

dared to take off their veils and look at it as they 
look at other things. The Scientist proceeds with 
open eyes and ears from what he thinks he knows, to 
find out what he wants to know — proceeds from the 
known to what reason can affirm as true. The Relig- 
ionist proceeds from a blind impulse, and from what he 
finds in certain books, received as of divine authority, 
to find what will satisfy his yearning and corroborate 
his beliefs. 

The method of the Religionist is at fault. It will 
never give him certainty. Religion should be stud- 
ied as other subjects are studied — studied in accord 
with and in the spirit of the scientific method. — At 
least, the following pages have been written under 
this conviction. 

The distrust felt in regard to all the means and 
institutions relied on for bettering the condition of 
men and conserving human happiness is deep and 
wide. Men look to them across a wild waste of 
unchecked vice and suffering — look and cry for help 
in vain. It is felt moie and more that there must be 
revolution — that a better destiny awaits humanity 
through changed -methods and conditions. 

The institutions of the past are called upon to 
account for their comparative failure — to render a 
sufficient reason to the future for continued existence. 
Even the church cannot be permitted longer to reign 
by ^'Divine Right." Tyranny and injustice will not 
longer be permitted to take refuge under her altars. 

The Old Religions have been weighed in the bal- 



PREFACE. IX 

ance and found wanting. The New Religion pro- 
mises better. But her success in a stretch of nearly 
2,000 years has not been all that could be desired. 
Are her latent potencies likely ever to prove equal 
to the occasion? Is a genuine Christian socialisnij 
and through it, a greatly improved condition of 
the race, possible among men? The author has 
hope in the future of humanity under the Christian 
regime. The discussion is very inadequate. No 
one can be more sensible of this than the author 
himself. 

Many important questions have been raised. If 
their discussion shall prove suggestive, he will be 
content. 

E. W. Gray. 

Bloomington, 111., June 25, 1890. 



CONTENTS. 



PART I. 

Anthropology^ . . _ . Pages, i to 117 

PART II. 

The Old Religions, ~ - Pages, 118 to 200 

PART III. 

The New Religion, - - Pages, 203 to End 



INTRODUCTION. 



There is a wonderful economy or saving in the 
forces of the universe. One thing so conditions 
and supplements another that nothing is isolated, 
unrelated or lost. Planets and suns and systems are 
held in the wide embrace of one law of gravity; one 
subtle, inexplicable life force pervades and animates 
the vegetable and the animal world. And such is 
this economy in the use of forces that there is practi- 
cally a whole world for each separate thing; a sun to 
shine for each plant and tree, and to give life to each 
insect, bird, animal, child and man. Practically, 
there is a world, a universe for each human being. 
The laws of nature, of chemical and vital affinities 
wait upon and minister to each one just as faithfully 
as if there were no others; for each the sun shines 
and the seasons come and go; for each there are the 
boundless realms of truth, of beauty, of love and 
right; and the fact that there are millions of these 
human beings to share in this vast wealth of things 
does not lessen, but enlarges the possibilities of each. 

Man is the face, the front, the forward-reaching of 
the creation. In him the creation comes to self- 



XIV INTRODUCTION. 

consciousness. In his backward reaching parts he is 
joined on to the material forces; is held fast by them 
so that one part of his being is automatic or self-act- 
ing, and moves along without his consent, and in sleep 
without his knowledge. And thus whilst he stands 
erect and with forward-looking face, his feet rest upon 
the ground and his backward-reaching parts shade off 
into the earth, of which they were once a part, and 
from which they have come; whether by evolution 
or special creation we need not now ask. 

But whenever, or however, man is here; and he is 
here with face and forward look and movement; and 
he is here with self consciousness. He not only is, 
but he knows that he is, and he turns round and talks 
with himself, and ask of himself what he is, and 
whence he came, and whither and to what he jour- 
neys. Nor can he cease to ask. 

Man is not only the face of creation, but, as a 
rational self-conscious being, he is at once the inter- 
preter and the interpretation of both himself and the 
universe. He can knov/ things only as he knows 
himself, and hence in the terms of self-knowledge. 
He knows matter because he is himself material; he 
knows reason because he is rational; he knows the 
good because he is .himself divine. And hence man 
has always and everywhere been a religious being, 
has had a religion and a worship. Religion is a part 
of his being, the outgrowth of the deepest roots of 
his nature. Religion was not an invention but a 
birth, and a growth; just as mankind see and hear 



INTRODUCTION. XV 

and feel because they have eyes and ears and nerves 
of sense, and just as men reason because they have 
minds and are in a w^orld of truth. So is man born 
into moral relations and duties and responsibilities 
and with a sense of right. 

And just as the material forces wait upon the body 
of man, so do the mental and spiritual minister to his 
mind and heart. Each one has his own world of 
truth, of reason, of sentiment and moral principle, 
and yet it is the same world for all, though differently 
apprehended. And hence it is only natural that where 
many of these separate beings have for a long time 
been under the influence of the same general condi- 
tions of climate, soil and scenery, and under like 
environments of social customs, laws and teaching 
that they should come to have a common religion, as 
that of the Hebrews, or Egypt, India, Greece and 
Rome. And naturally enough, too, the growth of 
ideas, and the intermingling of different races and 
peoples would result in modifications and changes of 
beliefs and forms of worship. But at the bottom, all 
religions are one; they are the objectivized and insti- 
tutionalized expressions of the rational and spiritual 
consciousness of the race; just as all thought and 
work are one in their common source and end, though 
upon lower or higher planes. 

It must be from some such higher conceptions and 
larger generalizations that such great questions can 
be intelligently studied; and such is the general 
standpoint of the author of the New Religion. In 



XVI INTRODUCTION. 

this way he finds in the nature and needs common to 
mankind a place and use for all the religions of the 
world; and hence their classification and the analysis 
of their peculiar excellencies and Qsffects, are broad, 
easy, natural and helpful. He does not seek to make 
a place for the new by denying the preparatory edu- 
cational values of the old, but gladly confessing these, 
and at the same tima showing their defects and limi- 
tations, the new appears as an orderly development 
or evolution from the lower to the higher; and thus 
Christianity appears as the complement, the fulfill- 
ment, the pleroma of all religions, and has in it the 
principles and the life that are yet to absorb and 
assimilate and unify all. 

In so far. Dr. Gray is in harmony with the genius 
and catholicity of our time, and is substantially at 
one with the most thoughtful minds; but when he 
comes to a definition of what Christianity really is, 
the agreements can hardly be so perfect, and espe- 
cially on the part of the dogmatic theologians. He 
seeks with a studious care to avoid controversy or 
giving offense, and yet, with a candor and love of 
truth that are supreme, he is borne along, and one 
point after another in the old orthodox system is left 
by the way, and at last the New Religion is substan- 
tially the new theology. 

He accepts the super or higher natural, but cannot 
admit the fact of law-violating miracles, and con- 
fesses that, as the miraculous has been generally 
defined by the orthodox world, Hume's argument 



INTRODUCTION. XVll 

against it is unanswerable. His views on this sub- 
ject are clear, strong and helpful. 

On the question of depravity, Dr. Gray differs from 
the orthodox view in making it functional rather than 
organic. He claims that the disorders that affect the 
lower and higher nature of man are in the form of 
deficiencies and excesses; but that these are derange- 
ments to be corrected; they do not inhere in the 
essence of his being. 

And, whilst with his almost extreme care not to 
enter the field of controversy, he does not distinctly 
deny the doctrine of the fall of man, and of original 
sin, it is evident that these old ideas have no place in 
his interpretation of Christianity; and having taken 
this ground, he very naturally finds no place or 
need for the old doctrine of a penal or substitutional 
atonement to ^^reconcile the Father," or to satisfy the 
claims of justice. 

But Dr. Gray has a deep conception of the actual 
sins and needs of mankind, and of the manifestation 
of God in Christ as the Father and Savior of the 
world. He emphasizes repentance as the change of 
the whole attitude of man toward God, and the moral 
order of the universe, and sees in justification not a 
cold legal pardon, but the charactering of the soul 
in righteousness and filling it with the life of God. 
And in all this he makes love the source, the moving 
power in God, and the efficient agent in winning the 
heart. 

Indeed, in the New Religion, as interpreted by Dr. 



XVI 11 INTRODUCTION. 

Gray, there is no place for the old doctrines of origi- 
nal sin or a penal or substitutional atonement. 

His method not being controversial, he has 
quietly slipped away from these old dogmas, drooped 
them out of his system, and without formality of 
statement or declaration of the fact, has put the moral 
or paternal view in their place. And in all this he is 
but returning to the earlier Greek interpretations of the 
Christian religion, in which the doctrines of original sin 
and substitutional atonement had no place. They 
are Latin accretions, brought in by Augustine, and 
adopted by the Roman Catholic church in the Fifth 
Century; they are not found in the Apostles' or the 
Nicene Creed; nor are the related doctrine of endless 
punishment — a subject not discussed by our author — 
and the uncomfortable fact is, that upon these points 
the orthodox Protestant church holds substantially 
the same views as the Roman Catholic. The reforma- 
tion of the sixteenth century did not go deep enough 
to touch the foundations; the reformers accepted the 
Latin theology and sought to reform the abuses of 
ecclesiasticism that had grown up upon it. This age 
is going deeper; it is returning to the earlier spiritual 
conception of the Greek fathers; it is a reformation, 
not of external forms and abuses, but of the thought 
of the Christian Vv^orld. 

The author of the NeAV Religion stands upon the 
broad and safe middle ground between the extremes 
of a too destructive radicalism on the one side, and a 
too dogmatic conservatism on the other. He takes 



INTRODUCTION. XIX 

truth for authority instead of authority for truth, and 
as a result comes out at last into a great and reason- 
able faith. The work bears abundant evidence of wide 
and careful reading, and of much honest and patient 
thinking, and through all is felt the spirit of reverence 
and an earnest desire to do good. It is a valuable 
contribution to the great religious thought-movement 
of our time, and in such a period of transition and 
unsettling will be a help to many minds and hearts, 

H. W. Thomas. 
Chicago, June 25, 1890. 



THE NEW RELIGION. 



CHAPTER I. 



"Whatever crazy sorrow saith, 

No life that breathes with human breath 

Hath ever truly longed for death. 

'Tis life of which our nerves are scant, 
O life! not death for which we pant. 
More life and fuller that we want." 

Optimism or Pessimism, Which? 

Notwithstanding the usual hurry and bustle of life, 
there are few men who do not, occasionally, at least, 
permit themselves to halt and stand face to face with 
death and the evils which beset and afflict mankind. 
That these evils are many, and grave, no optimist will 
deny; that little has been done, or can be done to 
diminish them, or to inform us how they can be 
escaped successfully, the pessimist will claim. 

There are evils which range high above all human 
control, and challenge our faith in the wisdom and 
goodness of the Creator. The earthquake, and storm, 
and flood; ^^the pestilence that walketh by night, and 
the destruction that wasteth at noonday." As to 



2 THE NEW RELIGION. 

these, and other evils which have hitherto baffled all 
human wisdom and power, and which must do so in 
time to come, what is the proper attitude of a reason- 
able being — what response can be made to the pessi 
mist? 

Shall we turn stoic and attempt to ignore them, 
and treat them as though they were not? Is this 
possible? If possible for Cato, for Epectetus and 
Zeno, is it possible for people of different nerve, possi- 
ble for you and me and all men? Let us be candid. 
To blink an evil is not to destroy it. 

Of shall we decide with Epicurus to ^^Eat, drink 
and be merry, for to-morrow we die?" But, can 
pleasure cope with pain and death? Besides, Epi- 
curus, art thou sure that thou canst quit the scene of 
intermixed evil to-morrow, and dost to-morrov/ help 
the pangs of to-day? 

The subject is large — too large for this time and 
place. But one may note: — 

I. Fear exaggerates our evils; it enumerates and 
dwells upon the chances against us; it closes our eyes 
to the chances in our favor. 

In the late war, when under the cannonading of the 
enemy, all our regiment, excepting one man, were 
crouchmg and hiding behind trees and logs, now 
and then a shell would crash through the distant tree- 
tops, or plough up the earth in a field more or less 
remote. *'Why, man!" cried a fellow soldier, *'Why 
don't you hide?" With cool philosophy, he replied: 
**The danger is very little. Don't you see there are, 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 3 

in this wide field, many places to miss you and only 
one to hit — the danger amounts to nothing." And 
he proved to be right, for not a man was that 
day touched. His fear had neither magnified the 
danger, nor disturbed his repose, while the rest were 
gloaming over disasters that were never to happen, 
and needlessly suffering the ^ ^terrors of war." 

2. Strictly unavoidable evil is a very rare thing, 
when compared with the actual good. 

To every one born blind and deaf, how many thou- 
sands open glad eyes and ears to all the beauties and 
all the music of earth and heaven. The adaptations 
of means to ends everywhere seem perfect, not a com- 
plete failure in the whole domain of nature. Man is 
not an ill-assorted exotic m this world, not an ana- 
chronism. He is fitted to his place, v/ith only the 
least 'seeming exception. Take away avoidable evils 
and there v/ill be left but comparatively few discords 
to break the harmony in the chorus of human life. 

Of the unthinkable millions of bioplasts that are 
building cells and organs and tissues and organisms 
in animated nature, how many fail in the perform- 
ance of their appropriate functions, or through failure 
jeopardize your life and mine? Of all the innumera- 
ble heavenly host each makes its swift and tireless 
flight round and round without touch or conflict. 
When a comet was discovered apparently dashing 
out across circles and spheres in wild and seeming 
disorder, men quailed, lest it might hurl itself upon 
some unoffending child pf the sky^ with instant di^- 



4 THE NEW RELIGION. 

aster. But a little more knowledge discovers that 
even the comet is not an unbound fiend, broken loose 
from the order of the upper deep. It, too, has its 
purpose and mission, and goes obediently forward to 
its eccentric destiny. 

But, if there be here and there a seeming break, 
striking down into the prevailing order, let us note 
that within certain large limits the Divine Artificer is 
present, with loving hands to work repair. 

The foul ulcer heals again. The fractured bone 
knits. The deepest disappointment drops more and 
more out of mind, and even the violated conscience 
ceases to chide when true sorrow has ministered re- 
tribution for sins committed. 

3. Then, too, and finally, there are compensa- 
tions. 

^^Blind Tom," who some years ago traveled in this 
country, was a marvel of success in certain kinds of 
music. A better development of the other senses, 
and especially the touch, largely compensates his loss 
of sight. 

It may be doubted whether the total deafness of 
Beethoven, at thirty years of age, did not after all 
prove a blessing, like many others, in disguise, by 
concentrating his thought upon the symphonies that 
have rendered him immortal. The mother goes down 
into the dark depths of a suffering, uncertain fate, 
to emerge again, if she survives, into the sunlight 
and joy of a broader and more significant life; and, 
how often have we seen the dire heart-breaks of some 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 5 

smitten child of seeming misfortune hasten to issue in 
a joyous experience which had had no antecedent 
equah Were there no darkness, CQuld we enjoy the 
hght? Evil, sometimes, because of our narrow vision 
and short sight, appears to be only evil, but afterward, 
when the sky has cleared, we can see the good it has 
brought us. All things, according to Emerson, are 
'^double,' and a compensating good ^^is mate of 
evil." Israel' s king could say, ^*It was good for me 
to be afflicted; ' and we are told that somehow ^^the 
Captain of our salvation was made perfect through 
suffering.'* Yes, there are compensations. Grant 
then, to the pessimist, that there are evils which can- 
not be escaped, that human life is sometimes darkly 
over-clouded, that it is short and feeble — of few days 
and full of trouble, and seemingly inadequate to its 
task, we may yet hope that in the hereafter there will 
be an answering life and benediction, adequate to 
compensate and cancel all loss, and all sorrow. Vice 
is self-destructive. It is always cutting and wound- 
ing itself^ — sapping its own foundations, and its power 
of self-destruction is cumulative as it advances. But 
virtue is self-preservative. It never hurts itself. It 
is cumulative in its power of self-preservation. It is 
in accord with nature's order — with all the eternal 
verities. Sometime, therefore, within the cycles of 
being, we may hope that vice will die, that truth will 
triumph over error, and that virtue will win the victory 
— will crown and bless the life immortal — Optimism. 
-M >Y -^ ^^Somehow good will be the final goal of ill.' * 



'The proper study of mankind is man." — Pope. 



CHAPTER II. 

The Ideal Man. 

The ideal physical man, proportional in body and 
limb is, say six feet tall, and weighs 175 pounds. 

For all purposes of strength, agility and endurance, 
this may be accepted as a standard. 

He is endowed with five senses, and with appetites, 
propensities and passions, or rather with such 
capacities as make these sensibilities possible and 
real. 

The real man varies from the ideal in stature, 
through a wide range of imperfection. We find him 
of every conceivable size and proportion, from the 
giant to the dwarf — from the typical and finely devel- 
oped American to the diminutive and swarth}^ Bush- 
man of Africa. 

Where no violence has been suffered, the power 
of endurance and length of life are, within limits, in 
proportion to the perfection of the physical organism. 

All men have a sense of something better possible — 
some intuition of an ideal state of perfection and hap- 
piness, toward which they aspire with something of 
desire and effort; and per contra a corresponding 
sense of imperfection and ill-desert, from which they 
would fain escape. 



8 THE NEW RELIGION. 

'^All human law proceeds upon the assumpton that 
the race is sinful, and history records the fact. There 
are no religions which are not found in the conviction 
of human imperfection."^ 

So ubiquitous and inscrutable has evil, moral and 
physical, personal and general, ever been that men 
have everywhere apothesized it. The Egyptian had 
his Typhon. The Brahmin and the Buddhist their 
Siva, the Persian his Ahriman, the Scandinavian his 
Loke, the Jew and the Christian their Satan. 

That the organic union of the spirit with matter 
was the source of all human imperfection and suffering, 
was the doctrine, not only of Plato, but of the Indian 
Seer long before him. 

According to the Greek philosopher, the human 
spirit had an ante-mundane existence, and was per- 
fect, and perfectly happy, ^^following in the wake of 
the gods." 

But owing to some direliction, he does not tell us 
what or why, he was condemned to be born a human 
being — was imprisoned in a material body, retaining 
only reminiscences of the former self. The senses 
may not be trusted. The power of sense must be 
broken ere he can escape life's torturing disabilities 
and resume his place with the gods. 

All philosophers agree in assertmg the frailty and 
imperfections of men. Aristotle, while admitting the 
universal infirmity, maintained, with singular insight 

I. Barnes Ev. Chris. 19th Cent. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 9 

and perception of the truth, the necessity of living in 
accord with the order of nature, as a condition of 
happiness. 

According to Homer, two jars stand in the Palace 
of Zeus, one filled with evil, one filled with good gifts 
for men; later there w^ere two filled with evil and 
only one with good. Later still, Simonides said, sor- 
row follows sorrow so quickly that even the air can- 
not penetrate between them.^ 

Seneca says, '^Not only have we transgressed; we 
shall continue to do so to the end of life." It was 
the complaint of our ancestors, it is ours, it will be 
that of posterity, that morals are subverted, that cor- 
ruption reigns. The human mind is perverse by 
nature, and strives and strives for what is forbidden. ^ 

That something of this human infirmity is due to 
unfavorable external influences — to climate, to envi- 
ronment, to heredity, is conceded by all An ideal 
republic from which the influences that tend to debase 
men are eliminated, and in which the race, under 
favoring conditions would grow toward perfection, 
was the dream of Plato, of Sir Thomas More and 
others. 

Mr. Buckle has elaborated with profound research, 
the iniSuences of climate and other surroundings, 
and claims that vice and error are subject to law, and 
vary with, if they do not depend upon, such sur- 

1. Ullman Coni. Heathen, with Chris, p. 72. 

2. Ibid, p -^8. 



lO THE NEW RELIGION. 

roundings. H^, says: 'It surely must be admitted 
that the existence of crime according to a fixed and 
uniform scherie, is a fact most clearly attested. We 
have cha?r:6 of evidence, formed with extreme care, 
under the most different circumstances, and all point- 
ing in the same direction, and all forcing us to the 
conclusion that the offences of men are the result of 
the state of society into which the individual is 
thrown."^ 

Mr. Leckey follows in the same vein of thought 
and arrives at the same conclusion. 

Des Cartes sa3^s: ''With respect to seemingly 
natural impulses I have observed, when the question 
related to the question of right or wrong in action, 
that they frequently led me to take the worse part.^ 

"We must regret that even in the best natures the 
social affections are so over-borne by the personal as 
rarely to command conduct in a direct way, and in 
accordance with this statement Compte proceeds to 
speak of the radical imperfection of the human char- 
acter."^ 

But this recognition of human infirmity in history 
and philosophy becomes an impassioned wail in 
religion. 

The rapt Isaiah exclaims with poetic passion, "the 
whol-e head is sick, the whole heart famt. From the 

1. Hist. Civilization, Vol. i, p. 21. 

2. Hand Book Philosophy, p. 210. 

3. Positive Philosophy, pp. 131-13^. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. II 

sole of the foot, even unto the head, there is no sound- 
ness, but wounds and bruises, and putrefying sores. ^ 
And the Psalmist, who was the best informed man 
of his age in relation to the nature and the needs of 
humanity, sa3^s in the same vein and to the same 
effect: ^^They are corrupt, they have done abomina- 
ble works, there is none that doeth good and they are 
all gone aside, they are altogether become filthy, 
there is none that doeth good, no not one;"^ while the 
characterization of Paul, in his letter to the Romans,^ 
is something terrible. 

In Adam's fall 
We sinned all, 

IS the brief postulate of the theologian; and the long 
wail of the church concerning '^Original Sin" and 
^^Total Depravity" is still ringing in our ears. 

But without further historical reference we may 
note that, while nearly all agree in asserting a com- 
mon human infirmity, wide differences of opinion pre- 
vail as to the causes and the extent of this infirmity. 

Those who have studied the subject easily divide 
into two classes: 

First, those who hold that it inheres in the material 
organism, and 

Second, those who hold that man was created per- 
fect, but subsequently fell into sin. 

Some of those of the first class hold with Plato and 
the Orientals, that the organic union of the originally 

I. Chap. 5. 2. Psa. 14. 3. Chap. i. 



12 THE NEW RELIGION. 

perfect spirit with matter has resulted in its intellec- 
tual and moral debasement, while thoje who hold with 
Darwin and the Evolutionists, believe that men have 
not yet outgrown the essential baseness of their origi- 
nal being. 

Of the second class there are those who hold: 
First, that the lapse of man was so complete and 
fatal as to vitiate his whole nature, and render him 
absolutely incapable of virtue,^ and second, that the 
lapse was so slight as only to disturb the balance of 
his mental and moral powers, and to generate certain 
tendencies to immorality, leaving him not vicious and 
sinful /<?r se, but weaker and more exposed to tempta- 
tion.^ 

Such, then, is the almost uniform agreement of 
observers as to the fact of human infirmity; and such 

1. Hagenbach Hist. Doctrines, Vol. 2, p. 25. 

2. The English church following Augustine and Anselm and 
fairly representing the so-called orthodox view of the Latin church 
puts it thus: "When man sinned, that in-dwelling spirit, upon 
which all his righteousness and holiness depended, was with- 
drawn, and that image of God, which had been imparted, was 
lost; and, along with this, men lost all power either of willing or 
doing good works pleasing and acceptable to God; so that he is 
very far gone from original righteousness, and of his own nature 
is inclined to evil; having no power of himself to help himself; 
not able to think a good thought or to work a good deed, his very 
nature being perverse and corrupt, destitute of God's word and 
Grace! In short, he was no longer a citizen of heaven, but a fire- 
brand of hell and a bound slave to the devil. Hist. Denomina- 
tions in Eng. and America, p. 240. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 1 3 

some of the varying opinions as to the nature and 
extent of this infirmity. The ideal man is but an 
ideal. The real man everywhere furnishes the proof 
of imperfection — sad, overwhelming. 

If the old Indian or Platonic view of the essential 
baseness of human nature be accepted, or still worse, 
if the church view of ^^Total Depravity" is admitted, 
it is difficult to see how any science, moral or ethical, 
can be built up. Every manifestation of the spirit 
has been touched and defiled, every moral phenome- 
non has been perverted; how, then, can it be known 
what the true humanity is, or can be? Where is the 
starting point in the investigation? Can you ascend 
from what is essentially imperfect and false to that 
which is essentially perfect and true? If man is 
without law and above law, to-day, in his baseness 
and depravity, what will he be to-morrow? There is 
nothing in his nature upon which to erect even a rea- 
sonable conjecture as to what will be his place or 
condition or character in the future, to say nothing of 
the much greater difficulty of determining the L^w 
and the destiny of his future being. 

This difficulty was noticed long ago, by Dr. Ward- 
law, in his Christian Ethics (4th edition, London, 
1844). He says, ^'Man is both the investigator, and, 
in pn.rt at least, the subject of investigation. In each 
of these views of him there is a source of error. The 
first arising from the influence of his depravity on his 
character as an investigator, and the second from the 
disposition to make his own nature (without advert- 



14 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ing to its fallen state) his standard of moral princi- 
ples, and his study in endeavoring to ascertain them. "^ 

If the conceded moral disorder be indeed so radical 
and complete, the conclusion of Dr. Wardlaw seems 
entirely logical. Dr. Calderwood, who distinctly 
admits the reigning moral infinity, very justly insists 
that whatever the disorder m.ay be, ^^it is not such as 
to destroy reason and render men unable to make true 
and changeless moral distinctions. " ^ It cannot be total. 

It seems evident enough that whatever imperfec- 
tion attaches to men, it yet leaves them in natia-e and 
kind the same. Was man originally endowed with 
intellect, sensibility and will power? He is yet so 
endowed. Was he created able to perceive, to 
acquire knovv^ledge, to reflect, to compare and make 
deductions? He is yet so able. Was he endowed 
with moral sense, conscience, emotion, passion, 
desire, affection. He is so yet. Could he make 
choice, exercise volition, recognize moral obligations 
and worship God. He can still do so. 

No elementary constituent has either been added 
or abstracted from the original mental constitution. 
Men are not wanting in the elements of their man- 
hood, but in the propriety of their functional activi- 
ties — in the proper adjustment and co-ordination of 
their powers — in the balance and equilibrium of the 
affectional nature. 

1. Vide Calderwood Hand-book of Moral Philosophy, p. 215. 

2. Ibid. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. l5 

He can acquire and classify knowledge, point out 
moral distinctions, discover law, and build science; 
but, mark you, with less success and brilliance of 
result, in consequence of his infirmity, whatever it may 
be, and however accounted for. 

But, leaving science proper out of the question, 
and looking to practical results, it is obvious that the 
respective theories of human infirmity differ greatly. 

If it be regarded as organic — congenital, then 
manifestly self-immolation — asceticism is the ethical 
and religious requirement. If it be regarded as a 
lapse from original perfection into absolute total 
depravity, then the death and destruction of the old 
man, and the regeneration of a new man is the 
desideratum. 

But, if the infirmity amount only to a disturbance 
and disorder of the once co-ordinated powers, then 
such discipline and moral influence as will tend to 
restore the balance and equilibrium of the mental 
and moral nature, is the desideratum — the logical 
requirement. 

If the theory of evolution be the true one, then 
what? Age on age of experience with the * 'Survival 
of the fittest," good feeding, sanitation, a favoring 
climate, and other meteorological conditions, and, 
especially, the study of the laws of health, the possi- 
bilities of heredity in the reproduction of life — all these, 
will subserve and forward the general improvement. 
But time, millions upon millions of years, is the 
desideratum. 



^^Quemcunque miserum videris hominem sclas."^ 



CHAPTER III. 

Analysis. 

Two principles must guide our inquiries into the 
nature of man; and not less when regarded as infirm 
and depraved than when considered in his normal 
condition as the creature of God. 

First. We must proceed by psychological analysis. 

It is not enough for the patient to inform his physi- 
cian that he is sick and suffering, nor will the intel- 
ligent physician begin his medication upon such 
information. 

He will, at leasts attempt a diagnosis — inquire into 
the location of the pain, the condition of the various 
organs and tissues and their respective functions, 
with a view of ascertaining, if possible, what the 
specific lesion or lesions may be. And, obviously, 
until this is done, he is not prepared to make intelli- 
gent use of remedies. 

^^To know ourselves diseased is half our cure." 

The case before us is one requiring diagnosis. It 
is not enough to say that man is a fallen being — a 
sinful and depraved being] not enough to describe 
his condition as one of moral disorder. It is not 
enough to 3ay with Jererrjicih^ ^^the heart is deceitful 



l8 THE NEW RELIGION. 

above all things, and desperately wicked;" ^ nor with 
Paul, in Adam all are ^^dead in sin;" nor with the 
churches, ^^totally depraved." These and similar 
descriptions, of which we have had many^ are general 
— indefinite, and do not convey specific information 
as to the psychological condition and status. 

Writers on mental and moral science have very 
properly directed attention to the elemental constitu- 
ents of the human constitution, but they have dealt 
more with the ideal man, than with the real man. 
The fact of imperfection and vice, as they appear in 
human conduct, is so constant and universal that it 
must be included as a factor in the problem under 
study. 

Dr. Calderwood, while admitting the fact of moral 
disorder, concedes to Dr. Wardlaw ^^that moralists 
have not given that amount of consideration to it 
which their admission of the fact clearly requires." 
And yet, in writing his excellent and discriminating 
^^Hand-book of Moral Philosophy," he himself dis- 
misses the subject in a very brief chapter near the 
close of his work — a mere appendix. 

Locke taught the need of mapping out the limits of 
the human faculties;^ and Bacon attempted a classi- 
fication of error-producing defects under the designa- 
tion of ^adols."3 

1. Jeremiah 17: 9. 

2. Stated by Leckey Hist. Ra. Vol. i, p. 400, 

3. Novum Organum. 



ANtttROPCLOGY. tg 

feut ail these attempts at classification are clearly 
wanting in psychological distinctions. The case is 
one of disease and must be studied and treated as 
such; a more intelligent diagnosis must be made 
out. 

Second. The second principle which is to guide 
us, and which we must keep in view, is the design or 
purpose of the Creator as it appears in nature, and 
especially in the nature of man himself. 

It is not here supposed that this design can always 
be discovered and apprehended in its length and 
breadth, that there are not instances in which it is 
impossible to discover it. But, there are, in most 
cases, evident and unmistakable traces of the divine 
purpose to which we shall do well to give earnest 
heed. 

If we look into external nature we shall discover 
upon every hand adaptation of means to ends in fur- 
therance of some specific purpose of the Creator — so 
many of these adaptations and so wonderful, that we 
cannot doubt the Divine wisdom and goodness. 

It is very clear that man himself was not made 
wholly for himself. Although complex and many 
sided in his being, he has an appropriate place, and a 
part to act in the cosmic drama. Endowed with 
the prerogatives of reason and conscience and 
volition, we should expect him, within the sphere of 
his capacity, to also suit means to ends and maintain 
the order and harmony of nature. When, therefore, 
we see him illy adjusting himself to the general order, 



20 THE NEW RELIGION. 

or worse than this, antagonizing it, we may be sure 
that he himself has ceased to be what he was intended 
to be, and should call a halt. 

Following as we may be able the Divine purpose, 
as the fabled thread of Ariadne into the dark and 
sinuous recesses of human nature, and with earnest 
fidelity seeking to comprehend man in his relations, 
we may possibly discover, on the one hand, some errors 
into which the more discursive thinking of men have 
led them, and, on the other, obtain a clearer view of 
some truths as yet but imperfectly understood. 



I hold a middle rank 'twixt heaven and earth, 
On the last verge of mortal being stand, 

Close to the realms where angels have their birth, 
Just on the boundaries of the spirit land. 

— Dierzhavm, 



CHAPTER IV. 

Two Natures. 

Man is a '' double-faced somewhat" of two natures 
— a higher and a lower — a physio-psychic and a 
psychic nature. But these so intertwine and blend 
as to make it difficult, with our present knowledge, 
to determine definitely the line upon which Lhey 
separate. 

On opposite sides they appear distinct enough — on 
this, the limitations of matter, through which, by five 
senses, the human soul struggles into consciousness — 
on that, reason and the higher sensibilities. Here 
appetite and propensity, with the fugitive gratifica- 
tion which indulgence brings — there thought and love 
and conscience, which heed neither time nor space; 
but, from either side they shade off together into 
apparent organic oneness. 

The predominance of the lower nature is conspicu- 
ous in the earlier life, there being scarcely a trace of 
the higher life in the infant. But, with advancing 
years, the germinal higher life develops, more and 
more, and becomes conspicuous in the ardent aspira- 
tions, the soaring thoughts and deep-toned sensibili- 
ties of ripe manhood. 

Thus organized into a complex unit, their respect- 



24 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ive forces operate upon and influence each other, 
and unite in producing the hfe and character of the 
earth-and-heaven-born man. Were they but properly 
co-ordinated and directed, the whole life would be a 
benediction, beautiful in the sight of men and of God. 

But alas! Quem te Dens esse jus sit, non es — thou 
art not, O man, what God ordained thee to be. The 
Divine purpose has been, to some extent, frustrated; 
there is not perfect harmony in the hierachy of the 
affections; the two natures have come into something 
of conflict, and human life and human happiness are 
at discount. 

The power of each over the other is potent, both 
for good and evil. A defective co-ordination and 
predominance of the physical may cripple and pre- 
vent the development of the higher life, even to 
insanity and idiocy, while illy directed spirit forces 
may work great damage to the physical organism.-^ 

Thus it is, account for it as we may, one is born a 
genius, another an idiot; one with such perfection of 
the physical and nioral make-up as to almost warrant 



I. The merest embers and spark of a headache may be blown 
into a roaring conflagration by the steady breath of hypochondria. 
Fear so disturbs the balance of the system that it delivers us 
bound hand and foot to many a disease to which there was not a 
shadow of necessity for surrender. You can scarcely count 
your pulse without increasing it beyond the safety line. Try to 
make sixteen out of your breathing rate by personal count and 
find what a disturbing cause are induced currents from the upper 
brain. — J. B, Taylor, in Christian Science Examined, p. 27. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 25 

in advance the development of a well rounded and 
beautiful character; but another with such a power- 
ful ^^bent to sinning'' as to make it next to impossi- 
ble for him to keep his wayward feet in the pathway 
of virtue. Between these extremes of organic infirm- 
ity, we have every degree and color of natural pro- 
pensity and tendency. 

These facts are of the utmost ethical significance. 
It is plainly impossible to intelligently prescribe a 
rule of discipline and conduct for any one unless we 
know something of his peculiar weaknesses and 
temptations. It is most evident that different persons 
start into life with widely different aptitudes and 
tendencies, a fact that should be distinctly recognized 
by the casuist and the teacher, and by jurors and 
judges in courts of justice as well. 

What, then, can be done — quid esse potest? Can 
the most happily constituted be improved? Can the 
less fortunate be helped? and how? These are ques- 
tions for the philanthropists and the philosophers of 
all the ages. 

It is the purpose of this work, in part, to assist, if 
possible, in making intelligent answer to these ques- 
tions — to examine, very briefly, into the feasibility 
and propriety of the reformatory measures that have 
been proposed by the leaders of thought, in different 
ages, and to present the claims of the Christian 
regime as best suited to the work in hand. 



Let us consider the reason of the case, for nothing is law that k 
not reason." 



CHAPTER V. 

The Lower Nature. 

How to improve the race in physical manhood is a 
question for the biologist, and the physiologist; and a 
very serious and important question it is, too, since 
confessedly a sound body has very close relations 
with a sound mind — ''Mens sanis in sane corpore.'" 

The fact that the length of a generation, in civilized 
countries, has steadily increased during the last 300 
years, is principally due to hygienic causes and better 
knowledge of the laws of health. As men emerge 
from barbarism, the life term of a generation is hardly 
more than a score of years. Three hundred years 
ago, in Europe, it was less than thirty years. The 
average length of life, as given by the British C37CI0- 
pedia, is in Europe, 34 years; in Prussia, 39.8; in 
Naples, 31.65. 

In the olden time it was said: '^The days of our 
years are three score and ten, and, if by reason of 
strength, they be four score, yet is their strength labor 
and sorrow, for it is soon cut off, and we fly away." 
Ps. 90: 10. And it is remarkable that this limit of 
life, observed by the intelligent seer 3,000 years ago, 
has remained substantially unchanged from that day 
to the present. 



28 THE NEW RELIGION. 

But, at best, this is a sadly low rate of longevity. 
Improvident living, exposure, the abuse of over-work 
and over-excitement, climatic and meteorological 
influences, avoidable and unavoidable diseases, whose 
name is legion, all unite to render the average life of 
man much shorter than it was clearly intended to be. 

We learn from the Bible record, that Abraham 
lived 175 years, Jacob 147, Moses and Joshua 120, 
and we know that such exceptional prolongations of 
life still occur. Peter Czartan, a Hungarian peasant, 
born in 1539, lived 185 years; and Thomas Parr, an 
Englishman, 152 years, and died of an accident. 
From the census taken during the reign of Vespasian, 
Pliny enumerates 740 cases, taken from the region 
between the Apennines and the Po, whose average 
age was 123; and Dr. Farr, from the census enumera- 



NoTE. — Among litterateurs, poets, and men of renown, Tasso, 
Virgil, Shakespeare, Moliere, Dante, Pope, Ovid, Racine and 
Demosthenes, died between fifty and sixty years of age. Lavalet, 
Bocaccio, Fenelon, Aristotle, Cuvier, Milton, Rosseau, Erasmus 
and Cervantes, between sixty and seventy; Dryden, Petrarch, 
Linnaeus, Locke, Handel, Gallileo, Swift, Robert Bacon and 
Charles Darwin, between seventy and eighty. Thomas Carlyle, 
Young, Plato, Buffon, Goethe, Franklin, Sir W. Herschel, New- 
ton, Voltaire, between eighty and ninety; and, between ninety and 
one hundred, Sophocles, Michael Angelo and Titian.* Their 
average length of life being well up to the good old standard of 
"three score and ten." These higher pursuits and larger respon- 
sibilities are not inimical to health an^ longevity as they are 
sometimes supposed to be. 

^ Bncj^clop. grittanica, 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 29 

tion and registered deaths in England and Wales, 
shows that out of every million of the population, 223 
attain the age of 100. Haller and Buffon could see no 
reason, in the human organism, why the rule should 
not be 100, instead of ^^three score and ten." 

^ ^Learned writers," says Dr. N. S. Davis, of Chi- 
cago, ^^have expressed widely different opinions con- 
cerning the natural duration of human life. Hufe- 
land has claimed it to be 200 years, and others have 
fixed upon periods varying from 100 to 150 years. The 
greatest age attained by any individual in modern times 
is 169 years; while the youngest old man on record 
was Louis II, king of Hungary, who was crowned 
when two years old, succeeded to the throne in his 
tenth year, was married in his fifteenth year, and 
died, wornout and gray, in his twentieth year." ^ 

But whatever the normal period of life may be 
or. was intended to be, there can be no doubt that 
men were born to die. All history, all the analogies, 
go to prove it. There may be, and doubtless are, 
erroneous conceptions of death. The change it effects 
is probably less than most imagine, and it may be 
more than others believe; but the change we denomi- 
nate death is the heritage of the race. Change is the 
law of all existence. Everything has its sphere and 
cycle of being — its death and resurrection. The very 
rocks trodden only by the foot of time, yield their 
imprisoned forceSi and start again into organic being, 

I, Fifty Ye^rs and gej^ond, pp. 17, 18, 



30 THE NEW RELIGION. 

We know that the earth is momentarily cooHng, and 
that the chill of death is already upon her North and 
South poles. The earth itself must die. The moon 
is already dead — so the astronomers say. 

''Dust thou art, and to dust shalt thou return/' — 
this is the irrevocable decree. 

But the fact most to our purpose here, and one to 
which attention is invited, is that the average life of a 
generation falls so lamentably short of its possibili- 
ties, as set forth in the cases of the greatest longevity. 

The life of a generation in the most enlightened 
countries is now about forty years, but much less in 
less enlightened countries. Why should it not be, 
instead of forty, a hundred years or more. Dr. 
Davis, whom we have just quoted with pleasure, 
speaking on this subject, says: ''The truth is, there 
is no natural period of life common to all indi- 
viduals," and such is the immense disparity, in the 
life-period of human beings, we must hesitate to ques- 
tion his statement. But, confessedly, there is a 
natural old-age limit, beyond which none pass, and 
this admitted, it implicitly follows that the period 
which elapses between birth, its natural beginning, 
and old age, its natural end, is the natural period of 
human life. 

' 'Order is heaven' s first law. ' ' Every sun and moon 
and star counts its revolutions regularly and on time. 
Vegetable life is annual, or biennial or triennial, etc. 
The life period of insect, bird and beast is, for each, 
something like a constant quantity. It is so constant, 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 3I 

at least, as to indicate the presence of law. The 
exceptions can be accounted for on the score of 
adventitious and disturbing causes. It indeed seems 
reasonable to suppose that two or more beings of like 
capacities, and like destiny, should have equal periods 
of life, in which to complete the cycle of its activities 
and enjoyments. Why should one sparrow or one 
squirrel live longer than another, and for similar rea- 
sons why should one man live longer than another? 
Is his physical life-period without law? — all a matter 
of chance and fate? 

There are proofs enough that certain causes play 
havoc with the human organism and cut short human 
life. May not all of such causes account for the dis- 
parity that exists in the life-period of the several indi- 
viduals, on the theory that each one is born to a 
natural period of life common to the race? 

But, if this be true, every child of humanity 
has a birthright to the full term of man's appointed 
life, whether it be loo or i,ooo years. But, if so, 
then what immense damage has been inflicted upon 
the unfortunates who die in infancy and childhood — 
upon all, indeed, who are taken off before their time! 

From this point of view we shall be able to see 
to what extent the physical life of man has degen- 
erated, and the distance he must travel backward and 
upward to reach the olympian heights to which he 
was appointed by the Creator. 

But though all must die, death never conquers — 
:2ie^er annihilates. The Phoenix springs from her 



32 THE NEW RELIGION. 

own ashes. The crawling, helpless worm leaps from 
its chrysalis into a more beautiful and wider life. 
Force may be transformed, it cannot be destroyed. 
Human life is here and now but dimly shadowed 
forth, its destiny but hinted at. It is shut into con 
ditions which more and more it spurns. These con- 
ditions were suited to the first stages of its being. 
They are utterly unsuited to the later stages and 
must be changed. The full-fledged human soul de- 
mands a changed environment — a ^^new heaven and 
a new earth" — better facilities and larger opportuni- 
ties to develop and display its powers, to fulfill the 
Divine purposes, and find its goal. 

The relation existing between a good physique and 
a good character is notably intimate and constant, 
and deserves the earnest attention of those who seek 
to improve and advance the race. 

The Romans, masters of the world 2,000 years 
ago, appeared to the Etruscans as a '^nation of 
kings." 

The better classes of Americans — those who give to 
the country its institutions, and its character, and who 
bid fair to become the second masters of the world, 
surpass all others in the uniform excellence of their 
physical organism. A sound mind in a sound body 
is an exhaustless source and the condition precedent of 
great power, and it is true not only as to power, but 
to knowledge, courage, virtue. 

But the most important fact to be noted in connec- 
tion^ is the indication the history of this, and gf 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 33 

conquering nations generally, furnishes, as to the 
the means of improving the race as such. 

Rome grew up out of an endless mixture of tribes 
and races; and, through infinite crossings and recross- 
ings, climbed to her superiority. When a nation has 
become rich, and out-grown the need of active and 
wide commerce, she soon settles into something like 
mediocrity. Grand and striking characters begin to 
disappear from her history. Physical and mental 
degeneracy set in and go hand in hand. 

America, thus far, has grown up under conditions 
not widely different from those of early Rome. In 
her blood runs every strain and type of European 
life, and with her, it is becoming more and more evi- 
dent, lies the progress and destiny of civilization. 

Heredity — What does heredity mean? What are 
its potencies as a factorig;;tlxQjiingj;guplift? 

In his lower nature^^roa^SKi^eSj^ and, 

as we have just sepa, a veryi>=p*w^^4id sicR^Y one at 
that, one-half the/r^e dying in childhoodJL. vtle may 
be improved or d«bg;sed^as are other animaip. If he 
is to be much imprtii^ecj^-he must be bett&'l^orn. 

The effort in our schools has been to develop and 
improve the higher nature, rather than the lower — to 
cultivate the mental powers by imparting knowledge. 
But, as a means of improving the race as such, it has 
not succeeded, and cannot. The improvement thus 
effected is not transmissable from parent to child. 
The individual is ^ ^educated" and, what of natural 
ability he has^ is nursed and petted^ and here and 



34 THE NEW RELIGION. 

there one wins distinction. Grant, that, by his her- 
culean efforts, he attains the heights of knowledge. 
It is well, but alas! he transmits nothing of his splen- 
did achievements to his posterity. His children, 
with such inherited capacities as a blind fate has 
bequeathed them, must begin, where he began, at the 
bottom of the hill, and, possibly with less ability than 
he had. It is the struggle of sisyphus. Generation 
after generation follows suit, and no progress is made. 
How many families actually deteriorate under the 
discouraging process? What race progress has been 
made since the days of Plato and Aristotle? When 
shall we find another Athens, or another Alexandria?* 
According to what we know of the laws of repro- 
duction and transmission of life, and this, confessedly, 
is very little, to our shame be it said, extreme ten- 
dencies may be checked, abnormalities corrected, 

*NoTE. — The assumption that the movement of man has always 
L3en one of progress, and that the lowest forms of savage life at 
present, illustrate, everywhere, an advance upon man's primitive 
condition, seems irreconcilable with the facts of history. Unfor- 
tunately there are, within the ranks of every civilized society, 
large communities of persons who, though surrounded by all the 
appliances of education, morality and civilization, are, in their 
modes of life, habits and instincts, savages. All know that the 
pauper and dangerous classes are continually recruited from the 
ranks of those above them. All know that ihese classes transmit 
their habits and character to their descendants, and that, were it 
not for the constant efforts of the better portions of society, they 
would threaten the very existence of civilization. M. B. Ander- 
son, in Johnston's Cyclopedia, Art. Man. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 35 

wayward propensity and illicit passion modified, at 
least, if they cannot indeed be bred out of the life 
entirely, and a better organic make-up secured. 

This much, at least as to the lower animals, is 
admitted. Intelligent stockmen understand and 
apply it. 

It is due to future generations that those who are 
directing the educational forces, should not only 
utilize all that is known as to such possibilities, but, 
that they should provide such facilities for observation 
and stud}^, as the obvious importance of the subject 
demands, in order that research may be pushed to the 
farthest limit. 

Those who contemplate entering into the marriage 
relation, should see to it that life's forces are so 
co-ordinated that their children shall not be cursed 
with hereditary vice and imbecility. They owe it 
rather to their children that they should be an 
improvement upon themselves — endowed with a better 
physique and better powers. 

It is hardly credible that intelligent men, capable of 
reason and foresight, should so completely ignore and 
disregard the possibilities of exalting their progeny, 
on this line of improvement as they do. It does not 
seem to have occurred to those who cherish their 
off-spring with infinite care and solicitude, and who 
labor to provide for them every advantage and com- 
fort, without regard to expense, and self-sacrifice, 
that, possibly, much that is more valuable than any- 
thing money can purchase, or parental affection can 



36 The new religion. 

suggest, might have been secured to them had they 
but exercised the sagacity and prudence of the com- 
mon stockman. 

What has been achieved in the domain of mere 
animal life, and with comparatively little systematic 
study, should stimulate the most earnest effort, to 
realize greater results, in the higher human life. It 
is one of the sad facts of history that so little atten- 
tion has been given to the subject in scientific circles. 

No chair in any institution of learning, either in 
this country or elsewhere, so far as I know, has been 
endowed with adequate means for prosecuting the 
study of heredity. Most of what is known as to the 
laws of reproduction and the transmission of life, has 
been contributed by naturalists and stockmen, with- 
out any regard to the possibilities of improving the 
world-life of man himself. The effort has been to 
cram him with knowledge, as though knowledge were 
the chief good to him, to cultivate the tree from the 
top downward, without regard to the soil and sap upon 
which its fruitage depends. But thus, what is gained 
for the individual, is lost to his progeny, and the toil 
of sisyphus goes on. 



CHAPTER VI. 

The Lower Nature. 

Appetite, 

The organic physical life is imparted under such 
physiological conditions as to require constant care 
and supervision— instant and continued alimentation. 
The air must give its oxygen, and various kinds of 
'ood must furnish nutrition. 

They must be regularly supplied and distributed 
throughout the system. 

And not less necessary is it, that the worn-out 
effete matter which has served its purpose and been 
discharged, shall be as regularly removed. The pro- 
cesses of the physical life are many and complex. If 
they were all understood by the individual he could 
not attend to and execute them. To do so he must 
blow at the lungs, and grind at the stomach, and 
pump at the heart, and unload at the emunctories, all 
at once and always, and yet not the half nor the hun- 
dredth part would be done. 

But, he is kindly released from all this. Another — 
the all wise and all good, stands unweariedly by, 
touching the keys, sustaining and directing the forces, 
and the wheels of organic life continue to spin. 



38 THE NEW RELIGION 

But we soon discover that the spirit within — the man 
himself, has, after all, a part to play. He must provide 
food in quality and kind for alimentation. He must 
provide against heat and cold and storm; and this 
requires labor and vigilance. He has a part to play. 
Will he do it? Will he do it as regularly and faith- 
fully as it needs to be done? 

He will. But, as if he could not otherwise be 
trusted with such grave responsibilities, he is bound 
by certain appetites and instincts to his part of the 
obligation. 

His instinctive love of money will provide the need- 
ful means; appetite and taste, or hunger, will find 
the food and see to it that he takes it in such kind 
and quantity as the organism needs; love of gain, 
appetite, taste, satiety, these are his prompters and 
his guides, and, thus equipped, he is started upon 
his world-life, whether it be for 100 or 1,000 years. 
Means to ends — we are just hinting at them — how 
beautiful all these adaptations, infinite in number and 
kind! Behold how one eternal purpose runs through 
all this blessed handiwork of God! 

^^And God created man in his own image. In the 
image of God created he him, male and female cre- 
ated he them, and God saw everything that he had 
created, and behold it was very good." 

But, should one yield to these propensities — get 
gain, indulge appetite, gratify taste — this were sen- 
suality, Epicureanism. These appetencies are the 
voice of God, and may not be disregarded. In 3^our 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 39 

shallow and short-sighted wisdom you sometimes set 
them aside, and substitute your own wisdom. It is 
an impertinence; it is worse than folly; it is a crimi- 
nal interference with nature's order. 

But you say the appetite and taste sometimes call 
for what proves to be injurious, and therefore we must 
take the dietary into our own hands. This is the 
exception and not the rule. 

Very often what you prescribe proves injurious. 
What then? In the presence of the Creator's wisdom 
yours is very small. Better follow appetite until you 
prove it to be morbid and untrustworthy. Appetite 
makes less mistakes than the doctor, and is more 
worthy of trust. 

That it is possible for disease, or the witchery of 
the modern cook, to stimulate appetite and taste to 
the point of causing them to make abnormal and hurt- 
ful demands, no one can doubt; and, it is equally 
clear, that some, losing sight of the grander possi- 
bilities of life, abandon themselves to beastly indul- 
gence. But such facts, taken in connection with the 
sickening consequences of such intemperate indul- 
gence, only make it more obvious and imperative that 
the benevolent Creator's order of things should be 
respected and maintained. 

''Since the improvement of cooking," said Frank- 
lin, 100 years ago, ''men eat a fourth more than they 
need." But the trouble of overeating arises most 
from too rapid eating, and want of mastication. If 
the food be bolted, too much is swallowed before the 



40 THE NEW RELIGION. 

stomach has time to say enough. The error is one 
not so much of appetite, or of cookery, as it is one of 
mistaken haste and want of time in eating. 

It is the function of appetite and taste, with their 
dehcate and delicious pleasures, to subserve and sus- 
tain the health and well-being of the physical organ- 
ism, and their delightful ministries are not to be 
undervalued. 

But, to prostitute the nobler self to mere animal 
gratification would but prove that one is more an 
animal than a man. 



CHAPTER VII. 
The Lower Nature. 

Aiuirice, 

"Be sure to turn a penny, lie and swear, 

'Tis wholesome sin. But Jove, thou sayest, will hear! 

Swear, feast, or starve, for the dilemma's even. 

A tradesman thou? and hopest to go to heaven?" 

Dr. Calderwood, in his Handbook of Moral Philos- 
ophy, argues, and logically, too, that the right to 
acquire property is established, not by deduction, but 
by intuition. But he does not inform us as to the 
amount of property it is right for any one to acquire. 
He claims that it is right and proper ^^to use one's 
powers for their natural ends only,'' and in this, too, 
he is certainly right. 

What, then, are the ^'natural ends,^^ for the attain- 
ment of which, in the matter of acquiring property, 
it is proper to use one's powers? 

Is the mere acquisition of property the end? Moral 
philosophy, while it has decided that it is right to 
acquire property, has not made answer. Men gener- 
ally devote most of their time and strength to money- 
getting. In view of the great and varied powers with 
which man is endowed, and especially in view the 



42 THE NEW RELIGION. 

the limited possible uses of money, it is evident 
enough that the acquisition of property, as such, is not 
an adequate end for human conduct. It can be use- 
ful, but for a short time, and at best does not respond 
to the higher needs of men; and, the question returns, 
what is the proper end to be had view in the matter 
of getting gain — what is the moral law involved? 

This, moral philosophy, and not ethics, must show. 
But this, it has failed to do. Somehow, and partly, 
no doubt, because of this failure, men have very gen- 
erally come to believe, if we may judge from their 
actions, that the acquisition of property, without 
limit as to quantity, is right as an end, provided it be 
acquired by fair and honest means. The practice of 
the world appears to accord with this view. 

What, then, is the law touching this matter. 

We can only arrive at the answer by inquiring into 
the uses — the real and only proper uses — of property. 

1 . The body must be cared for — it must be nourished 
and protected. But this requires houses, food and 
clothing, and these again require money. 

2. In the order of nature, and under the requisitions 
of society from which we cannot escape, others 
become dependent upon us in such a way that it 
becomes our duty to provide also for them what they 
need, and this requires money — property. 

3. And then, too, no one should content himself 
with providing only for the needs of the lower nature. 
Money has important relations with man's higher 
nature. He needs knowledge — the inspiration and 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 43 

gratification of art, music, painting, statuary. He 
needs something of leisure — the comfort of rest, and 
preparation for possible helplessness, sickness and 
old age, all of which imply and necessitate the acqui- 
sition and use of money. 

All these, and possibly other nameable ones, we 
may assume, are legitimate uses, and combined con- 
stitute a natural end, toward which it would be right 
to direct and exercise one's powers. 

How much these icses would require, must be left 
for the reason to determine, in view of the conditions 
involved; but the amount must not transcend these 
legitimate uses. If possible, the supply must be 
brought up to this requirement, it must not transcend 
it, on pain of misdirecting and irreparably damaging 
the nobler self — a competency, and no more. 

But alas! the old question. What is a competency? 

It plainly differs for each individual, and in any 
case it is a confessedly difficult question to determine. 
It is a question for ethical science, but its discussion 
does not lie within the scope of this work. 

Whatever it may be, however, it requires a good 
proportion of life's labors to provide it, especially if 
one make common cause with humanity, as enjoined 
by Christianity, and shrink not from the claims of 
duty to his fellow men. 

Two facts must now be noted — This propensity, like 
others of the human soul, is liable to misdirection — to 
abnormal, and especially to excessive development. 
Too often it hastens to become a passion. It is pain- 



44 THE NEW RELIGION. 

fully evident that men everywhere are too much 
engrossed by it. Men do not seek to acquire prop- 
erty with a view to its proper uses — its ''natural 
end,'^ though, contrary to all reason and philosophy, 
they make it the end. The strife for gain is altogether 
out of proportion with its possible legitimate uses. The 
instinctive love 'of gain, beautifully adapting the parent 
and the citizen to his own needs and the needs of 
others, has become avarice — a remorseless passion, 
and constitutes the characteristic activity of mankind. 
It is always crying more and more, with insatiate 
vehement desire. It has caused the most general 
and the most excited and prolonged struggle that has 
ever taken place in this world. What means this 
running to and fro? What means the storm and 
thunder of rushing wheels and roaring furnaces — 
money, money, for purposes good or bad? Mammon, 
in the world's Pantheon, is the one God, which, 
more than any other, receives the homage of the 
human heart. 

And the blighting effects of this idolatry are terrible. 
It saps and dwarfs the whole intellectual and moral 
nature. It beclouds conscience, dries up sympathy, 
perverts desire. It captures and binds the will and 
hurls its miserable victim into one hot pursuit of gold, 
leaving him a wretched miser, a crazy fool, an object 
of scorn and pity. 

Pope sketches him: 

"I give and devise," old Euclio said, 

And sighed, "My lands and tenements to Ned," 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 45 

"Your money, sir?" "My money, sir, what, all? 
Why, if I must," then wept, 'I give it Paul." 
"The manor, sir?" "The manor! hold!" he cried, 
"Not that! I cannot part with that," and died. 

From him whose unerring reason and conscience 
guide him steadily to the proper use of money, and 
restrain the exercise of his powers to their "natural 
end,'" we have every degree and shade of parsimony 
and avarice, down to the hardened wretch who, on the 
altar of his insane idolatry, 

"Sacrifices ease, peace, 
Love, faith, integrity, benevolence, and all 
The sweet and tender sympathies of life." 

The second consideration requiring notice in this 
connection, is the perishable nature of this affection. 

Whatever may have been the development of the 
passion for gold, and however it may have swayed the 
will and engrossed the life, it will end, and cease to 
be, with the present life. 

In the foregoing pages it has been assumed, and 
illustrated somewhat, that two natures combine to 
constitute man as he is in the present life. 

It is now time to note that one of these natures, 
the lower, has relations only with this world and can- 
not survive the grave. It is of the earth, earthy. It 
is adapted to the present sphere of life and environ- 
ment, and to this only. 

Appetite and taste, and, not less, the love of gain, 
have their uses and appropriate functions, but they 
belong to the mundanq lif^. ^^Flesh and blood can- 



46 THE NEW RELIGION. 

not inherit the kingdom of God." We know they 
do not. They go into the grave and remingle with 
the earth. In the process of eternity they may again 
start into organic Hfe; but never again in connection 
with the spirit that has outgrown them, and gone to 
its w^ider destiny. 

How much, soever, or how little, the lower instincts 
and sensibilities have added to the sum total of human 
life, at death their mission ends, and henceforth they 
can exist only as a memory. Indeed, it is well known 
that some of them cease before death. 

'^When I was a child," says Paul, ^^I spake as a 
child, but when I became a man I put away childish 
things;" and all men do the same. A noticeable 
change takes place in the co-ordination of life's forces, 
as life advances. The spirit lets go more and more 
of earthly interest as it takes hold more and more of 
the heavenly. Not infrequently, the old, on looking 
back upon their lives, see that they were once the 
sport of passions which have now lost their power, 
and wonder that they ever could have been so weak 
and foolish as they now appear to themselves to have 
been. 

And none of these lower affections will more cer- 
tainly cease their functions, for want of an object, than 
this love of money. 

But what then? He who has done little else in 
this world than to hunt gold — what of him? 

If we grant th^c ^ne has honestly devoted his ener- 
gies to providing the means needful to life's best pur- 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 47 

poses, as he is bound to do, he must yet realize at the 
end of his world-life, a great change, not only in the 
circumstances and conditions of his life, but in the 
objects of it. 

But he has not broken with the Divine order. He 
has not violated his conscience, or committed sin, in thus 
employing his powers. He has made the trip over 
the sea of his initial life without foundering upon 
breakers, and under the sunshine and the smiles of 
the Eternal, he enters upon the higher life beyond. 
'^Well done, thou good and faithful servant, thou hast 
been faithful over a few things, I will make thee 
ruler over many. Enter thou into the joys of thy Lord. '] 

But suppose his love of gain has become an absorb- 
ing passion, and, going beyond the legitimate uses of 
property, he has devoted thought and care, and 
anxiety and exhausting labor — all, to getting gold, as 
an end, and this is what very many do, or, at least, 
seem to do — then what? At death he must instantly 
realize that his ^ 'first love" has died within him. The 
object for which he so habitually lived and struggled, 
is gone; and the disposition which made him capable 
of such damaging misdirection of his energies, now 
disqualifies him for his new relationships. He has 
foundered upon the sea of his mundane life, and the 
garnered treasures, the fruitage of all his care and 
toil, have gone down forever; and, stranded on the 
nether shore, what is he but a hopeless bankrupt in 
a foreign and inhospitable land. He has not laid up 
for himself treasures in heaven. 



48 THE NEW RELIGION. 

His acquired fortune may have been princely, and, 
left behind, it may prove a blessing or a curse — who 
can tell? But as to himself, he cannot bank upon it. 
Nothing of it remains to him but the memory of his 
great and damaging mistake, and the consciousness 
of a misdirected life. 

'^How hardly shall a rich man enter into the king- 
dom of heaven/' 



I feel that I shall stand 
Hence forward in thy shadow. Nevermore 
Alone upon the threshold of my door 
Of individual life I shall command 
The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand 
Serenely in the sunshine as before, 
Without the sense of that which I forbore — 
Thy touch upon the palm. The widest land 
Doom takes to part us leaves thy heart in mine 
With pulses that beat double. 

— Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Sexual Love. 

We have been climbing up through the lower nature 
of man. Let us put foot upon the last round and 
mount to the heights of his world life. 

The normal relations and character of man, in his 
present state of being, cannot be regarded as com- 
plete, without the co-ordination and adaptation of 
male and female, and the interplay of those delicate 
and charming sensibilities, which characterize, at 
least, the reproductive period of human life. 

The subject is a delicate one, and for this reason, 
perhaps, has not received the attention of the writers 
on moral philosophy which its ethical importance 
demands. 

The legitimate indulgence of the sexual passion is 
sanctioned by all the powerful considerations that 
influence men to cherish and cling to life as a price- 
less boon. 

If life is worth living at all, its inherent worth and 
blessing must equal the sum of all that is good in life, 
as the fountain includes the stream. And who does 
not realize it to be such? Who would not quickly 
give up all, to save his life. ^'AU my possessions for 
an inch of time," said the dying queen. 



52 THE NEW RELIGION. 

But, if to become a conscious being, endowed as a 
human soul, be such a Divine consummation, how 
should we pause with reverence before those who are 
charged with the duty and the responsibility of 
reproducing and perpetuating the race. They are 
trusted with the dangerous power of executing the 
Divine will, and with what humble and prayerful 
solicitude such a trust should be accepted! — with 
what conscientious fidelity and singleness of purpose 
should such high prerogative be exercised! 

The duty, in a sense at least, is Voluntary, and, 
will not such solemn responsibilities be declined? 
No. The passion of sexual love is instinctive — an 
intuition, and maintains such power over the will, 
and so subordinates conflicting motives, as to secure 
and w^arrant the acceptance of the trust, with its 
responsibilities. 

Whatever may be our religion or our philosophy, 
we can hardly doubt that it was made the duty of 
man to ^ ^multiply and replenish the earth," in order 
that it may be ^^full of the knowledge of the Lord as 
the waters cover the sea." This consummation has 
never been achieved, at least so far as we know. 
The earth has never been filled to its capacity with 
human beings. 

The number of people in Belgium to the square 
mile in round numbers, is 484, while the average 
population per square mile in the whole of Europe, 
Asia, Africa, on the American continent, and 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 53 

Australia, is but sixteen — the average of the ''Dark 
Continent/^* 

With the proper facilities for the exchange of the 
products of one section of the earth with those of 
another — ''free trade and sailors' rights," there can 
be no doubt that the limit actually attained in Bel- 
gium, and closely approximated in other countries, 
could be greatly surpassed, and the fears entertained 
by Malthus, of a disastrous surplus and excess of 
population, may well be considered groundless. 

In accord with this evident need of multiplying 
and replenishing the earth, the instinct of sexual love 
is born into the race, and has its legitimate and 
sacred functions — its beneficient and far-reaching 
purposes, pure and holy in the sight of God. 

But alas! in the face of such proofs of these divine 
and solemn appointments, what do we behold! 

The race has indeed been reproduced and main- 
tained through the long ages, and for some hundreds 
of years has been slowly augmented, but the fore- 
going figures go to show how slow the process of 

*Dr. Strong, in his valuable work entitled "Our Coun- 
try, " gives the following: "According to recent figures there is 
in France a population of 188.88 to the square mile; in Germany, 
216.62; in England and Wales, 428.67; in Belgium, 481.71; in 
the United States, not including Alaska, 16.88. If our population 
were as dense as that of France, we should have, this side of 
Alaska, 537,000,000; if as dense as that of Germany, 643,000,000; 
if as dense as that of England and Wales, 1,173,000,000; if as 
dense as that of Belgium, 1,430,000,000" — a population equal in 
numbers to that of the whole earth. 



54 THE NEW RELIGION. 

filling up the earth to its capacity has been. Man^ 
misdirecting and abusing his high prerogative, has 
miserably failed to work into the larger purposes of 
the Creator. If we may accept the Hebrew Canon 
as reliable history, the race, once at least, closely 
approached entire extinction. 

That nature's order and purpose have not been 
respected and maintained, no one can doubt. Here, 
as elsewhere in the affectional nature, misdirection 
and great disorder prevail. The sexual passion has 
run riot into all conceivable and damaging excesses, 
and under conditions wholly incompatible with the 
proposed reproduction and extension of the race. In 
its revolting history it has furnished proof of the 
deepest and foulest depths of human depravity, any- 
where to be found among men. Its seething corrup- 
tion is to be seen in all lands — its foul presence may 
be traced through the ramifications of society and 
into almost every household. Alas for poor misguided 
humanity! ^Ts there no balm in Gilead — no physi- 
cian there? Why, then, is not the hurt of the daugh- 
ter of my people recovered?" 

But, granting all that can be said of sexual love — 
its divine appointment and sacred functions, and, 
bewailing its measureless misdirection and abuse, we 
must not fail to note its destiny. It is of the lower 
nature of man, and belongs only to the world life. 
Whether it has sweetened or embittered the life, or, 
added much or little or nothing to the sum total of its 
realizations, ^tis all the same — it cannot survive the 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 55 

grave, except as a memory. In the divine order of 
things, it has served its purpose. It was appointed 
to preside over the reproduction and extension of the 
race. It walked hand in hand with the highest pre- 
rogatives and most solemn responsibilities, and shed 
its fascinating light upon life's pathway. How beau- 
tiful in its appointed ministries! How sacred and 
God-like its functions and its fruitage! 

But, with the mundane life it goes. The undying 
spirit, emancipated from its grosser environment, is 
also relieved henceforth, from the responsibility of 
reproducing and extending the race of mankind. It 
has outgrown the limitations of its initial stage of 
being, and leaps into the larger life and liberty of 
angelic being. Happy, thrice happy, he whose world 
life has filled its mission, and to whom it shall be said 
in the end, ^^Well done." 

^^In heaven they neither marry nor are given in 
marriage, but are as the angels of God." 

All these merely biological forces lie within the 
sphere of the perishable life. They have relation to 
time, and space, and opportunity. Their purposes 
are served here and now. But the higher powers — 
reason, conscience, the affectional nature (exclusive 
of merely instinctive animal affection), and the will — 
are not limited by time or space. None of tnem have 
special or enforced limitations to the present state of 
being. 

If one then give himself up to appetite, to sexual 
love, to the passion for gold, to any or all of the mani- 



56 THE NEW RELIGION. 

fold but shortlived and fugitive pleasures of the sen- 
suous nature, let him know that he is living the life of 
the beast that goeth downward to the earth. '^If 
thou sow to the flesh, thou shalt of the flesh reap 
corruption." 

But, if one will assert his manhood, covet the eter- 
nal verities, consecrate himself to the pursuit of 
knowledge and truth, to obedience to the behests of 
conscience, to the blessed ministries of pure and holy 
love, then let him know that he is treading already 
the highlands of the life imperishable — that he is liv- 
ing the life of a man whose spirit goeth upward — ^^If 
thou sow to the spirit thou shalt of the spirit reap 
life everlasting." 

^^Be not deceived. God is not mocked. Whatso- 
ever a man soweth, that shall he reap." 



CHAPTER IX. 

The Higher Nature. 
Intellect, 

For the purposes of our inquiry, we may adopt the 
classification of man's power usually made by men- 
tal and moral philosophers — three classes: (i) 
Intellect, (2) Sensibilities, and (3) Will. 

By intellect, let us understand, his thought-power. 
To it belong intuition, perception, reflection, compari- 
son, inference or deduction; or, as including all these, 
reason. 

Let us adhere to our method, and compare the 
matter-of-fact man, as we see him in society, with 
our ideal of a perfect man, with a view of defining 
his imperfections as closely as may be. This done, 
we shall, perhaps, be able to estimate the value of 
the remedies that have been proposed for his bet- 
tering, and to determine* which of these seem best 
adapted to his needs. 

^^Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright, 
for the end of that man is peace." 

We shall soon discover that man is defective in his 
thinking power — has less ability, and knows less, 
than he was intended to have and to know, on any 
theory of his complex and high-born nature. 



58 THE NEW RELIGION. 

At his best, he can know but comparatively little of 
the knowable. ' ^Man is not the measure of all things, ' ' 
nor was he made capable of becoming omniscient. 
The mere fact that he is ignorant of some, or of many 
things knowable, must not be charged to his 
imperfection. If, as a thinking being, he fulfills the 
purpose of the Creator, we must account him perfect. 
But evidently the wisest do not know as much as they 
ought to know for their own good; and this much, we 
may assume, it was intended men should know. 

We know very well that the five senses, upon which 
men must rely in setting up the business of life,^ is 
not always reliable. The sources of error open up 
with the very first movement of thought, and under 
every form of fascinating illusion, they are found 
along all life's pathways. 

It were a blessed thing if men could see eye to eye 
always and everywhere, — if every effort made to know 
the truth were made in the right direction — were to 
accord with and aid every other such effort and prove 
successful. But they are not so made. 

All classes of men give sufficient proof of intel- 
lectual anaemia. Philosophers studying the same- 
phenomena, arrive at the most diverse conclusions. 
In metaphysics each delving student appears to every 

other in 

"Wandering mazes lost." 

Theologians, assuming to be taught from above, and 

holding the torch of divine light in hand, grope 

I. Leibig. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 59 

their way, it would seem, very much as other men, 
through the dark, and differ from and fight with each 
other, to the shame of humanity. 

The diversity of opinion and theory among men is 
bewildering. Shall we decide with Darwin or 
Agassiz, Hall or Tyndal, McCosh or Herbert Spencer? 
Who approaches nearer the truth, the laughing or the 
weeping philosopher? Plato or Epicurus, Aristotle or 
Bacon, Hobbs or Hegel, Des Cartes or Locke, 
Berkely or Condilac? What theories have come only 
to testity to the weakness of human reason, and the 
futility of speculative thought? What absurd myths 
and dogmas are yet enshrined in the canons of our 
most enlightened faith? 

'^After 2,000 years of psychological pursuit," says 
Auguste Compte, ^^no one proposition is established 
to the satisfaction of its followers."^ 

The infirmity of the human reason has profoundly 
impressed the thinking men of all the ages. 

An oracle had pronounced Socrates the wisest of 
the sages, and he humbly accepted the flattering 
imputation, saying, ^ ^Possibly it may be so, since I 
have discovered that I know nothing." 

Anexagoras plaintively exclaims: '^Nothing can be 
known, nothing can be learned, nothing can be cer- 
tain. Sense is limited. Intellect is weak. Life is 
short." 

Xenophon tells us that *'it is impossible for us to 

I. Quoted by Pressense Origines, p. 6, 



6o THE NEW RELIGION. 

be certain even when we utter the truth." Par- 
menides declares that ''the very constitution of man 
prevents him from ascertaining the absolute truth." 
Empedocles affirms that ^'all philosophical and 
religious systems must be unreliable, because we have 
no criterion by which to test them." Democritus 
affirms that ^^even things that are true cannot impart 
certainty to us," that ^^the final result of human 
inquiry is the discovery that man is incapable of 
absolute knowledge;" that, '^if truth be in his pos- 
session, he cannot be certain of it." Pyrro bids us 
reflect upon the necessity of suspending our judgment 
of things, ^ 'since we have no criterion of truth." 
His followers were in the habit of saying, ''We assert 
nothing — no, not even that we assert nothing." 
Alcibiades denied both intellectual and sensuous 
knowledge, and, going beyond Socrates, publicly 
averred that "he knew nothing" — not "even his own 
ignorance."^ 

These dicta will be recognized as somewhat tropi- 
cal, and, perhaps, as having a touch of melancholy, 
but they fairly indicate the self-distrust and humility 
of all great thinkers. Arrogance and self-conceit in 
the presence of the conceded limits of human knowl- 
edge, may be accepted as good evidence of disgrace- 
ful shallowness. 

That our knowledge has touched the truth at some 
points, or very nearly approached it, is proved by at 

I. Drapers. C, p. 202. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 6l 

least two facts: (i) As to the transmission of intelli- 
gence and certain forms of intercourse and com- 
merce it has practically annihilated time and 
space, and (2) It throws its light into the future, 
and enables us to know, with something of the 
prophets ken, what shall be in the hereafter. 
But at best our knowledge of the truth is confessedly 
but fragmentary. No candid scientist will claim for 
it anything more or better. The light that throws 
its rays into the future is dim and flickering. It does 
little more than to reveal the dense darkness in which 
we grope, and gives little assurance that human rea- 
son, at least in the present state of being, will ever 
be able to penetrate the dark depths of the unknown 
to any great distance. 

But error, manifold, unblushing, stalks forth into 
the light at every turn, and the energies of one age 
are largely exhausted in correcting the damaging mis- 
takes into which its predecessor had fallen. 

Man has his place in the order of nature, with an 
appointed sphere of activity, and within this sphere 
there is scope for the exercise of all his powers. The 
range of his five senses, by means of which he is put 
in communication with the external world, is short — 
a fact sufficiently indicative of the narrow limits of 
possible knowledge. 

But even within these limits, we find him blunder- 
ing and blundering. *^His being's end and aim" he 
should know. He should be able to apprehend and 
appreciate the design and purpose of the Creator, as 



62 THE NEW RELIGION. 

they relate to himself, and affect his well being. He 
needs to know enough to keep him from adopting 
errors, and holding them for the truth — enough to 
enable him to perceive and appreciate the truth when 
presented — enough to keep him from falling into 
damaging mistakes — enough to make it clear to him 
what he ought to do. So much knowledge he evi- 
dently needs to qualify him for the duties and the 
privileges of life in the present state. 

Upon a cursory view he seems very far from pos- 
sessing, or of even being able to acquire, so much; 
and yet we must believe that an all-wise Creator 
would endow his creature with such capacities to 
know, as would qualify him for his appointed sphere 
of activity, and adapt him to his environment. 

What then? Are we to believe that the ignorance 
of men — their errors, their mistakes and consequent 
sufferings are necessitated — that somehow the Cre- 
ator has failed to endow his creature man with ade- 
quate ability to avoid mistakes and follow the right? 
Or shall we believe that something has interfered with 
the normal development and proper exercise of his 
powers — that some lapse has taken place? 

The uniform adaptation of means to ends else- 
where in nature, seems to prove that the former of 
• these alternatives must be rejected. This is no world 
of chance, nor are all those who accept error for 
truth idiots, though we can hardly escape the convic- 
tion that the inherent intellectual power of the race 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 63 

is less, from some cause, than it was originally 
designed by the Creator to be. 

However this may be, one great source of error 
and damaging mistake seems common to men. 

It is matter of easy observation that men who make 
mistakes usually do so under the lead of some appe- 
tite or passion. It is almost a proverb, that what one 
does in anger he does wrong, and anger is not the 
only passion that sways the will, and leads him into 
error and wrong. 

It may not be quite easy to say just how much rea- 
son is at fault, and how much undue passion is at 
fault, in any given case. One thing seems certain. 
Men of well regulated passions and good poise make 
comparatively few mistakes. And this is a fact of 
the greatest significance. 

Suppose the appetites and passions were brought 
into normal and complete subordination, and held in 
perfect adjustment with the moral sense or con- 
science, by one who has done what he could to know 
the truth and the right, if such a case is supposable, 
would he be likely to fall into serious and hurtful 
errors, and jeopardize his well-being? Is it not 
indeed evident that the error often springs more from 
an undue influence of some inordinate desire or pas- 
sion than from want of mental power? Men always 
know better than they do, and the deficiency — the 
infirmity — seems not to be in the intellect, but elr-e 
where. 

The intellect is handcuffed and rendered powerless 



64 THE NEW RELIGION. 

by over-heated passion, which sways the will and 
seeks to pervert the reason. It may be able to point 
out the way to the truth and the right, but it cannot 
command the passions, and it is passion — over-mas- 
tering desire — that drives the barque upon the break- 
ers and extinguishes the light which the intellect 
would otherwise throw upon the dangerous sea. 

But more than this. There is much difference in 
the value of different kinds of knowledge — a fact 
not half appreciated by the ordinary seeker after 
knowledge. 

Some knowledge, like the fruit of the tree of knowl- 
edge in the Garden of Eden, is ^^fair to look upon 
and good to make one wise." Some knowledge is 
absolutely worthless — some positively injurious. 

Cramming the head with ill-assorted knowledge 
does not make one wise, but hurts more than it helps. 

And here, precisely, lies the immense importance 
which attaches to plans and courses of study. 

It should be the object of the school to impart wis- 
dom rather than knowledge. ** Wisdom is the prin- 
cipal thing." Knowledge otherwise really useful 
may be acquired, but, under the domination of some 
prejudice or abnormal passion, may fail to be useful. 
More frequently, however, some idle curiosity or dis- 
ordered affection leads to an utter waste of mental 
power. 

Wisdom is the principal thing. It implies something 
of knowledge, it is true, but more; something of 
properly regulated sensibility as well, 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 65 

As we shall see more clearly further on, mental 
philosophers, following Socrates and Plato, have, in 
all the ages, exalted the intellect at the expense of 
the sensibilities, and the damaging fact stands out in 
all our systems of education. 

Teachers have sought to communicate facts to their 
pupils — facts of language, of geography, geometry, 
astronomy, chemistry, philosophy. They have 
sought to impart knowledge, to stimulate inquiry, to 
inspire literary and scientific zeal and ambition, as if 
a knowledge of science were the chief good. To 
develop and cultivate the intellect is the one great 
purpose of the prolonged drill and discipline of the 
schools generally. '^Knowledge is power,'' and the 
young, ardent student, touched by this wand of 
Ithuriel, begins, anon, to dream of distinction. The 
ignis fatuus of some ambition beguiles him into the 
hot pursuit of knowledge as the one means of exalting 
life. 

But, in the meantime, what has been done to develop 
a pure and holy love, and to bring the soul into har- 
mony with God and all that it is good — to secure that 
readjustment and equipoise of the affections, upon 
which, more than upon all else, a good and noble 
character depends? The sensibilities, and not the 
intellect, constitute the motive powers of life, and 
upon them, more than upon any mere knowledge, 
the character depends, whether it be good or bad. 

To educate is to lead out; but within the soul tnere 
is more to lead out than thought power — the moral 



66 THE NEW RELIGION. 

sense, and other senses. The moral nature is to be 
developed and directed. 

Besides, there is within a ^'bent to sinning,'* as all 
history declares, which is not to be led out, but 
rather to be restrained and held in check. Educa- 
tion must not be indiscriminate. If it be indiscrimi- 
nate you may develop a monster instead of a more 
perfect man. To curb this tendency to irregularities 
and excesses of conduct, to direct the developing 
affections to their proper objects, is infinitely more 
important than to develop the thought power. You 
need not fear. The reasoit is always fore^nost in the 
pathway of virtue. Men always know better than 
they do. 

If you can restrain the nascent tendencies to vice, 
and direct sentiment to its proper objects, your edu- 
cation will be a success, though it should be less 
sparkling and brilliant in its intellectual features. It 
is rectitude that students need more than knowledge 
— a conscientious determination to do the right 
always and everywhere, semper et ubicunque. But 
what is it that determines rectitude? Will the 
mastery of science, as set forth in the college text 
books, secure rectitude? Some of the highest forms 
of intellectual culture make uncomplaining bed-fel- 
lows with the highest forms of vice. It was the bril- 
liant conception of Combe in his '^Constitution of 
Man," that the devil himself — say what 3'Ou will of 
his Satanic majesty — is but '^a mighty intellect broken 
loose from the restraints of morality. " 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 67 

If, theii; there be any force in these considerations, 
in all our schemes of education, such knowledge 
should be imparted to the learner, and such influences 
brought to bear upon him as will be most likely to 
awaken moral conviction and stimulate the moral 
sense, or conscience. 

The limits of this work will not permit an attempt 
to specify in detail what these kinds of knowledge 
and influence are. 

It will be granted that some kinds of knowledge 
have little to do with sensibility. They do not stir 
the soul or awaken feeling. They are ^^dry," unin- 
spiring, abtruse, and, for most students, difficult to 
acquire. Generally the recondite principles of 
abstract science and the various forms of speculative 
knowledge are of this character. 

Such knowledge is suited and only useful to those 
who have a penchant for abstract and speculative 
science. It is neither suited to, nor useful to the 
masses, and hence should not be mcluded in any 
course of study and discipline mtended for the 
masses. 

Obviously there are kinds of knowledge that relate 
more immediately to the sensitive and moral nature. 
I may mention — 

1. Such knowledge as brings to light the benevo- 
lent designs and purposes of God in nature — his wis- 
dom, his active benevolence, his beneficence, his 
love. 

2. Such correlative knowledge as discloses and 



68 THE NEW RELIGION. 

emphasizes the duties of men to each other, in their 
domestic, social and political relations in life — knowl- 
edge, if you please, that is rich in the fruitage of sen- 
timent and fellow-feeling. 

3. Also such knowledge and such teaching, 
whether by precept or example, as tend to beget a 
pure and holy love, — love of the beautiful, the sym- 
metrical, the harmonious, the true, the good — such 
knowledge, and such teaching as would be best suited 
to bring out the strength and power of personal love 
with its beautiful and overmastering ministries. 

We pretend to be Christians, and, with Nico- 
demus, we recognize one teacher ''come from God." 
We bow with veneration to his superior wisdom. 

In the course of study and discipline through 
which he put his pupils, there was little attention 
given to speculative thought, little effort put forth to 
lead out or educate the thought power, except as it 
related to the further purpose of awakening the con- 
science, and securing a proper adjustment and bal- 
ance of the affections. But to accomplish this fur- 
ther purpose be devoted his most earnest attention 
and prolonged effort. He sought, with unflagging 
zeal, to bring men to a proper sense of their moral 
condition, to awaken true sentiment and fortify all the 
virtues — to bring the whole man, mind, heart and will 
into harmony with all that is good, that is^ with God. 
He saw what we should see, that the well-being of 
men, in all the relations of life, ^depends more upon 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 69 

the moral than upon the intellectual status, and this 
view determined the method of his school. 

Such a school was a great novelty. Its like had 
never been known. It differed, toto coelo, from the 
Greek schools, then so popular. It differs scarcely 
less from the schools now in vogue, in which the 
classics, the higher mathematics and sundry accom- 
plishments make up the greater part of the course of 
study. Our schools are modeled after the fashion of 
the Pagan Greeks, more than after that of the Divine 
Christ, and they tend to produce the Greek character 
more than the Christian character. With the Greeks, 
we assume that the intellect is the chief constituent 
of human nature — the chief factor of human life and 
destiny. But the great teacher whom we nominally 
venerate, more philosophical, more correct in his 
estimate of the character-forming power of the sensi- 
bilities, and more clearly apprehending the disci- 
plinary needs of the soul, addressed himself to the 
development and proper direction of the affectional 
nature. 

And in this he succeeded — succeeded as no other 
teacher ever did succeed — not by formal teaching 
so much as by his manner of life. He it was that 
more and better than all others let his light shine. 
If the range of ideas was comparatively narrow, it 
had altitude and depth. If his words and his 
thoughts were few, they were ^^words that breathed, 
and thoughts that burned.'' 

His estimate of the worth and high destiny of men, 



70 THE NEW RELIGION. 

even the lowest and the meanest, his impartial, 
exhaustless love for the race, his heart of sympathy 
and helping hand, his self-abnegation and ready sac- 
rifice of himself for the good of others, these all 
appealed to the heart and made him the exemplary 
and master-teacher of mankind. 

Can any one doubt that were the humility, the 
freedom from selfishness, the love and sympathy, of 
this unique and wonderful teacher, carried into our 
schools by the teachers, can any one doubt that 
they would speedily work great changes for the bet- 
ter? Would students then come out of school so 
short-sighted, so engrossed with the vanities of life? 
Would they graduate with the self-conceits and shal- 
low ambitions now too often characteristic of the col- 
lege '^graduate? " 

Let me not be misunderstood. It is not urged 
that there is not enough ' 'religion" taught in the 
schools — not that. 

The religious sense is an intuition, an instinct, and 
will develop parri passu with the affectional nature. 
The religion that is taught is mere superstition, and 
bears the fruits of superstition. 

But, give us the method and teaching of Jesus in our 
schools, and we shall see the fruits, not in temples and 
pagodas, not in towering cathedrals, not in the increase 
of cloistered Monks, not in the multiplication of rites 
and ceremonies, and much ado in matters of religion, 
for he favored none of these things. But we shall see 
among the educated more beautiful, Christ-like char- 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 7I 

acters — a diviner morality in private, and social and 
public life — a morality that will not fail to flower up 
into religion and intelligent worship. Let the aims 
and purposes of this Gallilean school of thought — so 
different from the Greek — become the aim and pur- 
pose of all the processes of education, and we may 
hope — and this is the point I make — the time will 
come when knowledge and virtue will walk side by 
by side, when humility and love will replace ambition 
and selfishness, when wisdom more than knowledge 
will characterize the graduate, and when the merely 
sensuous and perishable shall cease to be the princi- 
pal object of life and effort. 

We shall then have less occasion to charge disability 
and infirmity upon the intellect. The ^^bent to sin- 
ning" so noticeable among the affections, affects the 
thinking power, and precipitates men into mistakes 
and errors, which they would avoid were the passions 
properly adjusted and the whole man brought into 
normal equipoise. Ignorance is not the evil so much 
as mal-adjusted sensibility, to which we must now 
turn. 



CHAPTER X. 

The Higher Nature. 
Sensibilities, 

And here we enter a realm more maiarious and dis- 
ordered, no doubt, than that of the intellect proper. 

Plato represents the spiritual powers that consti- 
tute man as three souls — a thinking soul, an appe- 
titive soul, and a courage soul — the intellect, the 
sensibilities, the will. 

Elaborating this classification, he sets up their 
relative position and importance, in the spiritual 
hierarchy, under the figure of a driven chariot, the 
thinking soul mounted in the seat, holding the reins, 
the other two souls harnessed in as steeds — a figure 
which sufficiently indicates the prominence which he 
gave to the intellect. And it is especially noticeable 
how this fashion of exalting the intellect has prevailed, 
and yet prevails, among philosophers and theologians. 

* ^Ignorance the evil, knowledge the remedy," has 
been a widely accepted dogma since the time of 
of Socrates, and may be found in the Old Religions 
as a dictum accepted long before his day. 

Thought, the offspring of the intellect, is, indeed, 
first in the order of precedence, and is instantly 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 73 

necessary to consciousness; and this may account for 
the disproportionate importance attached to the 
thinking power by the philosophers. This same ten- 
dency to magnify the reason appears in rehgion, as 
the age-on-age struggle over creeds and heresies suf- 
ficiently proves. The theologian, while attaching 
prominence to speculative views, and correct creeds, 
has sought rather to exalt the will. He is wont to 
say, destroy sensibility, crucify the flesh — the will 
reigns and determines destiny. The tendency to 
asceticism has been strong in all religions, and it is 
the one intent and purpose of asceticism to subordi- 
nate sensibility, and even to destroy it from the 
soul. 

This mad purpose has had its fullest development 
in the orthodox Buddhist, who feels it to be his duty 
not only to subordinate emotion and passion, but to 
overmaster and annihilate all desire, as the condition 
of entering into Nirvana. 

Here and there a philosopher has united with the 
theologian in exalting the will. 

M. Pressense praises Main DeBiron for his '^Theory 
cf Effort," by which, he says, this philosopher has 
introduced * 'liberty into the initial act of knowl- 
edge."^ According to Main De Biron, to think is to 
will, therefore the being whose existence is revealed 
by thought is not simply a reasoning being, as he is 
represented in the famous Cartesian motto, cogito, 

I. Study of Origins, p. 91. 



74 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ergo sum, but is primarily a free-acting being in his 
initial existence. 

It would be difficult to overstate, says Pressense, 
the service which Main De Biron has rendered to 
philosophy by his ^ ^Theory of Effort," which he him- 
self puts into this formula: ^^I will, I act, therefore 
I am."i 

This conclusion is evidently born of an effort to fix 
upon man the entire responsibility of his conduct. 
But the theory assumes that to will is a simple psy- 
chological process, an assumption which cannot for a 
moment be admitted. What imaginable act of the 
will is possible without an involved thought and 
motive. The formula, I perceive, I feel, therefore I 
am, is nearer the truth, as I suppose, than either that 
of Des Cartes or of De Biron. 

We are unconscious of many of our mental pro- 
cesses, as has been so well pointed out by Carpenter, 
and the first act of cerebration forcible enough to 
spring a distinct feeling, is the one that begins to 
awaken consciousness. The thought could not be 
known but for the attendant feeling. The thought 
and feeling combined give rise to consciousness, and 
the rawakened consciousness cognizes all acts and 
states of the ego which enlist sensibility and no 
more. 

Sensibility is the condition precedent and neces- 
sary to conscious existence, and any theory either in 

I. Ibid., p, 94. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 75 

philosophy or religion which subordinates sensibility, 
is seriously and fundamentally at fault. 

In the order of sequence we have first, indeed, 
thought, then sense, then volition; and, if Plato's 
driver could keep his seat and hold the reins, it 
might do; but we know that, in actual life, passion 
dethrones reason, and, seizing the reins, drives the 
chariot whithersoever he will, and the will, making 
the best of the usurpation, tugs away at the traces. 

Who does not know, if he will but reflect, that you 
cannot touch human experience at any point without 
touching some sensibility; and it is the pride and 
boast of true manhood that it is capable of those fine 
sympathies and lofty sentiments and aspirations 
which ally the soul to the divine, and go to make up 
the best type of life in the weakest and in the strong- 
est as well. 

It is the province of the reason to perceive what is 
good, and right, and true; but, if upon such percep- 
tion there arise within no appreciation or delight — 
no approving or pleasure-giving sentiment — what 
significance could we attach to these acts? 

^^We could easily imagine," says Mackintosh, '^a 
percipient and thinking being, without a capacity for 
receiving pleasure or pain. Such a being might per- 
ceive what we do; if we could conceive him to rea- 
son, he might reason justly, and, if he were to judge 
at all, there seems to be no reason why he should not 
judge truly; but, what could influence such a being 
to will or to act? It seems evident that his exist- 



76 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ence could only be a state of passive contemplation. 
Reason as reason can never be a motive to action. 
It is only when we super-add to such a being sensi- 
bility, or the capacity of emotion, or sentiment, or 
desire or aversion, that we introduce him into the 
world of action."^ 

The spiritual movement is largely independent of 
the will. The sight of one suffering, especially if he 
is known to be innocent, and rudely imposed on, 
excites pity, nolens volens, and what is true of this 
form of sensibility is true of others under suitable 
conditions. What significance indeed, or what value 
could life have, if we except those pleasurable sensa- 
tions that constitute happiness. 

What shall we say then of Sakya Mounie, of Plato, 
of Zeno, and the rest, who regard sense as an 
element of disturbance, and a curse! What shall we 
say of the thousands and the millions of ascetics who 
have sought to quench sensibility as something 
antagonistic to spiritual perfection, purity and 
happiness! 

Giving to the several senses then their due promi- 
nence as factors of life, how shall we classify them? 

The philosophers are not agreed upon any classifi- 
cation—a fact which goes to prove that no mental or 
moral science proper exists; for science rests upon 
undisputed data. 

In the first place, there is no agreement as to the 

I. See Haven's Mental Philos., p. 532, 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 77 

naming or nature or relative rank of the various 
forms of sensibility. 

And in the second place the various forms are 
treated as heterogeneous elements, and classified 
without regard to their cognate relations. 

The briefest review will verify these statements. 

As there is but one source of thought, and all kinds 
of thought, wise or foolish, great or small, new or 
old, the most eccentric and the craziest, spring from 
the same fountain, the intellect; and, as the will is 
one, while exercised in every direction and applied to 
every conceivable purpose, now driving the victims 
of rage to deeds of daring and death, and now execut- 
ing the beautiful ministries of love, so also the affec- 
tional nature is one. It is a unit and not a medley. 

The kaleidoscope, filled with a mass of heterogene- 
ous elemental forms, is ready, at every turn of the 
instrument, to exhibit new and ever varying figures, 
as a kind of chance may determine. But the affec- 
tional nature is not a kaleidoscope. The affections 
are of kin — belong to the same family, however seem- 
ingly different and even antagonistic they may some- 
times appear to be. They are homogenous, and take 
on different forms and characters only as they are 
sprung by different causes and appear under different 
conditions. 

Under the head of this thought we shall find that 
love is the stock and parent sensibility. 

But it has never been recognized as such by 
philosophers, 



78 THE NEW RELIGION. 

According to the academicians, the emotions are 
included under four principal ones, to- wit: Fear, 
desire, joy and grief, and were regarded as generically 
different — no recognition of love. 

Among the moderns. Hartley divides the sensi- 
bilities into grateful and ungrateful. 

Since gratitude is clearly one form of love, we may 
give Mr. Hartley credit for approaching, at least, a 
recognition ot love The English writers, says Mr. 
Haven — from whom principally I am condensing this 
account — the English writers derive all emotions 
from three principal ones, to-wit. Admiration, love 
and hatred. Here we have love as one of three 
elemental constituents, generically different. 

Whewell finds two — love and anger. He 
approaches simplicity and recognizes love as dividing 
with anger the realm ot sense. 

Calderwood finds three — desires, affections, 
judgment. 

Mahan finds appetites, emotions, affections, desires. 

Other classifications could be quoted, but these 
may be considered representative, and will suffice. 
They show at least that there is no agreement as to 
classification. They show that the several forms of 
sensibility are regarded as ^^original and distinct ele- 
mentary piinciples.'* They are expressly so claimed 
by Mahan, and hence there is no recognition of kin- 
ship in their nature. They constitute a medley. 

They show that there is no agreement as to their 
relative rank or degree of prominence in the moral 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 79 

constitution, and finally they show, and this is our 
point, that the passion of love has no adequate recog- 
nition as a predominant and governing sensibility in 
human nature. 

Hartley, Stewart, Upham and Hav^en agree sub- 
stantially, in finding malevolence, ingratitude and 
hate in the mental constitution; while Mahan admits, 
without any attempt at psychological analysis, 
a ^ 'moral depravity, in which affection is turned to 
hate, by crime in the subject." 

It seems positively inexplicable that the greatest 
agreement amoi^g these authors should be in holding 
the greatest error; especially as they are all Christian 
authors, and familiar with the Christian religion; for, 
what could be wider of the truth than to suppose that 
the all-wise and benevolent Creator placed ^'malevo- 
lence/' ''ingratitude" and "hate" in human nature, 
as original and distinct elementary principles? 

Is man made in the image and likeness of God, a 
medley of good and bad elemental constituents, 
"original and distinct,'^ so distinct that "neither can 
be resolved into another, nor can they all be resolved 
into a common principle?"^ The theory is incom- 
patible with what we know of the benevolent pur- 
poses of the Creator — the order and perfection of his 
works. 

It remained for Jesus, the divine "Son of Man,'* 
who has shed such a flood of light over every field of 

I. Mahan. 



8o THE NEW RELIGION. 

our moral nature, to disclose the true nature of man, 
to reveal his moral constitution, which, certainly, 
was very differently and very imperfectly understood 
by all his predecessors. 

At his coming, he was announced as the ^ ^savior" 
of men, and as such he must comprehend the depths 
from which they were to be rescued. 

To save men he must understand and appreciate 
their needs, and respond to them. He must bring to 
light such a knowledge of their moral condition, and 
effect such a readjustment of it as salvation implies. 

Accordingly, first among philosophers, and first 
among teachers of religion, he taught us that the pre- 
dominant and characteristic sensibility of the Father 
in heaven is love, and that, as love dominates the 
Father, it should dominate his offspring. 

Christian, or Infidel, we must acknowledge that the 
passion of love has ever played a great role in the 
drama of human life. 

The child is born and bred under its hallowed bene- 
dictions. It crowns and blesses the hymenial altar. 
It presides over the home and sweetens all domestic 
relations. It is the messenger of sympathy and help 
to the suffering and needy. It is the inspiration of 
all that is good and noble and true among men. It 
sways all hearts and makes the soul akm to God. 
All this we know and believe. 

Jesus exalted love as no one ever did before him, 
as if he regarded it as the prolific fountain whence 
flows every virtue — every form of sensibility. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 8l 

In accord with this teaching it will be found that a 
true psychological analysis will show that the divine 
affection is also the human affection, at least when 
the soul is holding normal relations with the order of 
nature. 

It is evident enough that joy and grief and pity and 
fear, etc., are derivatives of love. Love existing, we 
have only to change the conditions and circumstances 
of life and we have any one and every one of the 
others. But without love we could have none of 
them. 

Hate is the very opposite of love, and least likely 
to be found having any kinship with it of any that 
could be named. And yet, if we will but reflect a 
little, we shall see that hate is the product of love as 
the shadow is the product of light. 

If you love the true, the right, the good, you must hate 
the false, the wrong, the evil, and the intensity of the 
feeling of hate will be in proportion to the realized 
feeling of love. ''Ye that love the Lord hate evil." 
There is, according to Solomon, a time to love and a 
time to hate, and the old prophet commands us to 
*'hate the evil and love the good.' To do so, but 
indicates a normal and proper state of the affections. 

If you are in warm sympathy with the good, and 
an object appeals to your affections which appears to 
be good, it will excite your love; and the closer you 
come to it, and the more you are interested in it, the 
greater will be your love. 

Bui, on the other hand, if it should appear to you 



82 THE NEW RELIGION. 

as mean, wicked, false, corrupt, devilish, it will excite 
the same holy feeling, but now it will not appear as 
love, but as hate and disgust; and the keener the 
sense of good, the keener will be the sense of evil. 
Hate is but the reverse side of love. If we could 
suppose that one were completely indifferent to both 
good and evil, it is plain that then he could feel 
neither love nor hate. True hate is but true love, 
conditioned by the presence of evil and wrong. 

Dr. Calderwood, who seems all at sea in his classi- 
fication of the sensibilities, is nevertheless a very 
close and critical observer of mental phenomena. He 
says: 

^ ^Affections take the form of love or hate, according 
as the objects of them are esteemed in any sense, 
good or bad, and the form of reverence or pity, as 
their objects are esteemed superior or inferior in 
nature and experience.-'^ Here we have a recogni- 
tion of the fact that the transformation of the sensi- 
bilities, through external causes and conditions, is 
possible. If the affection known as love can become 
reverence or pity, and especially if it can become 
hate — a form of feeling at the farthest remove from 
love — then it may, under suitable conditions, take the 
form of any other sensibility. 

If you pass a current of electricity through nitrogen 
gas, you get a pinkish, purple color^ pass it through 
carbonic acid gas, and you get a green color; pass it 

T. Handbook Moral Philos., p. 155. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 83 

through hydrogen, and you get a violet color; but 
pass it through oxygen and you get a peach-blossom 
tint. Precisely the same current produces all these 
different colors, which thus vary with the conditions 
under which they are exhibited. 

Thus the parent affection becomes now joy, 
delight, or now grief, anger, jealousy or even hate, in 
the presence of conditions which give it form and 
color; and the so-called '^malevolent passions,'^ con 
sidered as '' original and distinct elementary princi- 
ples^*^ disappear from the human soul. 

If one's love be what it should be, as enjoined in 
the great commandment, all its derivatives will be what 
they should be, and we shall behold the perfect man 
whose end is peace. 



So from the heights of will 

Life's parting stream descends, 
And, as a moment turns its slender rill, 

Each widening torrent bends. 
From the same cradle's side, 

From the same mother's knee, 
One, to long darkness and the frozen tide, 

The other to the peaceful sea. 

—O. IV. Holmes 



CHAPTER XI. 

The Higher Nature. 
The Will, 

Of the intellect we have predicated something of 
infirmity; of the sensibilities, more. What now of 
the will? 

Considering man in his normal relations as a crea- 
ture of God, what are the functions of the will? If 
disease and disorder have affected his volitional 
nature, how? What is the proof of it, and what is 
the remedy? 

Definitions of the will are numerous and various, 
but they do not help us to a very clear conception of 
the functions of the will proper. 

By something like general agreement, the will is 
that faculty or capacity of the mind which enables ur 
to prefer or choose between two or more object^.. 
This definition is, perhaps, good enough as far as it 
goes, but certainly it is far from complete A full- 
blown act of the will is not merely subjective. It 
has in it something of objective activity It moves 
muscles — does something. 

Dr. Haven says, '^the will is but another name for 
the executive power of the mind.'' 

To execute means to carry into effect, but, as the 



86 THE NEW RELIGION. 

mind*s executive, what does the will carry into effect? 
The concept involves an object. What is it? 

Dr. Calderwood says:^ ''The will is a power of 
control over the other faculties and capacities of our 
nature, by which we are enabled to determine per- 
sonal activity. " 

But evidently the will does not, and cannot control 
the other faculties and capacities of our nature. It 
cannot stop the processes of thought, nor always hold 
them to the desired object. It cannot arrest the flow 
of feeling, nor determine its kind. It cannot com- 
mand the storm of passion to cease, nor change sor- 
row into joy. Both the intellect and the sensibilities, 
under circumstances, at least, reject the control of 
thej will. Its power to determine personal activity is, 
therefore, at least limited. 

In common parlance the will is that power which 
moves muscles and brings things to pass. 

Our consciousness attests the fact that some form 
of sensibility — a feeling which is usually known as 
desire — precedes every act of the will and constitutes 
the motive to action. We desire to have or enjoy 
something, and this desire causes us to put forth 
efforts to obtain it. Following perception or thought, 
there springs up emotion, passion — some form of sen- 
sibility, pleasurable or painful — and this begets a 
desire with corresponding action. Of this order and 
process we are ceitainly conscious. We all love the 

I. Handbook Moral Philos., p. 165. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 87 

truth. You perceive, we will suppose, a possibility 
of discovering some truth. Your love for the truth 
begets a desire which prompts to action. Or again, 
one acts from a sense of duty. Now, what are the 
facts? The intellect or reason perceives what is 
right; this awakens in the moral sense — conscience — 
a feeling of obligation to go forward. The will 
responds to the feeling, and the duty is performed. 

Do you say one does not always act from a sense 
of duty? The mental process is the same. A per- 
ception of possible pleasure — it may be forbidden 
pleasure — awakens desire to enjoy and this becomes 
a motive to action. The will responds to the desire 
and seeks to realize on it. 

The illustrations are brief, the thought easy. 

It is then, we may now assume, the function of the will 
to respond to the claims of the several se7isibiliiies, 
including the moral sense, or conscience, of course, 
in the order of sensibilities. 

But Mr. Haven says — and in this he agrees with 
other teachers — ^'We often desire what we do not 
will, and 7£//// what we do not desire." 

He quotes the following from Reid: ^'A man 
athirst has a strong desire to drink, but, for par- 
ticular reasons, he determines not to gratify his desire. 
A judge, from a regard to justice and the duty of his 
office, dooms a criminal to die; from humanity and 
particular affection, he desires that he should live. 
A man, for health, ma}^ take a nauseous draught for 
which he has no desire, but a great aversion." 



88 THE NEW RELIGION. 

To the same effect he quotes from Locke: ^*A 
man whom I cannot deny, may oblige me to use per- 
suasion to another, which, at the same time I am 
speaking, I may wish may not prevail on him. In 
this case it is plain the will and the desire run 
counter." 

And from Upham he quotes the case of Abraham 
offering Isaac, and the case of Brutus sacrificing his 
sons. 

It seems very remarkable that these distinguished 
philosophers did not perceive that, in the cases given, 
there is one feeling or desire combating another. 
Each one has reasons or motives for doing what he 
did, while, at the same moment, he feels the force of 
reasons or motives for not doing what he did. A man 
athirst has a strong desire to drink. It will quench 
his thirst. It will make him feel good — give him a 
species of pleasure. These, perhaps, are the particu- 
lar reasons that urge him to drink. But he has also 
a desire to avoid the consequences of drinking — a 
desire to maintain his health and respectability — 
these, and other considerations, possibly, stand over 
against the appetite for drink, and he determines to 
act on the demand of his better nature. It is clearly 
a case of thirst for drink against the moral sense — of 
appetite against conscience. It is one kind of feeling 
against another — a feeling of thirst with its desire on 
one side, a feeling of duty with its desire on the 
other, and the will, always free to discuss the motives 
presented, decides against drinking. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 89 

The same is clearly true in the case of the judge, 
in the case quoted from Locke, and in the cases of 
Abraham and Brutus, from Upham. 

The cases are one in their teaching. The case 
given by Locke is admirable for its concealed sophis- 
try. We have friendship on the one hand, pulling at 
the will, and a secret conviction, or sense of right, on 
the other, pulling at the will, in a contest that lasts 
during the effort to persuade, and friendship gets the 
better in the end. 

On the very surface of all these cases, there are two 
kinds of feeling — one in favor of drinking, one opposed, 
one in favor of acquitting, one opposed, one in favor of 
taking life, one opposed, and, in all the cases given, 
excepting that from Locke, the desire to do the 
right prevails. ''Voluntas est quce quod cum ratione 
desiderat, ' ' 

It is the more remarkable that Mr. Haven should 
be betrayed into this oversight, since he had already 
said: ''Were there no feeling awakened by the intel- 
lectual process^ would there be any volition with regard 
to the object perceived?''^'^ 

But, if ^^preponderance of desire" settles the ques- 
tion, what becomes of the freedom of the will? The 
old question again to the front, '^Liberty** or ^^Neces- 
sity," which? Well, both. As to liberty, a Httle. 
As to necessity, much. 

Brought into the world-life without his consent, 

I. Moral Philos., p. 532. 



go THE NEW RELIGION. 

endowed with forces and tendencies which he cannot 
restrain, and appointed to a sphere of activity from 
which he cannot escape, man finds himself the sub- 
ject of hopes and fears which he cannot suppress. 

Whether he takes his being under the scorching 
heat of the tropics, in the genial warmth of the tem- 
perate zone, or amid the eternal snow and ice of the 
arctics, is not a matter of choice, but of fate. 
Whether in Christian, heathen, or barbarous lands, 
is not choice, but fate. Whether as a giant or a 
dwarf, white or colored, whether an angel or an idiot, 
it is necessity. 

Hunger and thirst come unbidden. Propensity and 
passion cry for indulgence and gratification, on pain 
of infinite suffering. Thought spins on, the fires of 
feeling burn on. Life's stream surges onward, and 
death awaits the helpless victim — It is yet necessity. 
But you say to this puny victim of necessity, do 
something — anything — help a man, or hurt a man, 
take this course or that course, and he will say to 
you, yes, I will think of it. You must. No, if, upon 
examination, I shall please, I will. But I will com- 
pel you. No sir, you invade my liberty — you cannot, 
I defy you — liberty. 

Projected into being you find yourself in a world 
abounding with objects,, which stir your sensibilities, 
and promise possible gratification. There are many 
of these objects — hundreds, thousands of them. You 
are a stranger and know little of your position or pos- 
sibilities. You know not what will gratify you most. 



ANTMROPOLOGV. 9 1 

As yet, knowledge has developed no ''preponderant 
desire," and you are in doubt. But you are able to 
examine. You go through the field, turn things over, 
measure and weigh them. You come to believe that 
any one of a hundred things would give you pleasure. 
But one, or a few excite you most, and you choose, 
and act on your choice. The will, true to the law of 
its manifestation, responds to the preponderant 
desire. If you have been wise and chosen well, you 
have entered upon a course of life that will carry you 
out into all the beatitudes, and the very winds and 
waves will sweep you onward to a glorious destiny. 

But if you have been unwise or perverse^ and have 
taken the wrong drift, you have entered a course 
which will plunge you over cataracts, and into whirl- 
pools, and your very liberty has become necessity as 
relentless as fate. 

In the early dawn of experience — and every day he 
is in the early dawn of some experience — man knows 
little. A thousand things await his attention, his 
study, his choice. 

Alas! He does not always come to the examina- 
tion unbiased. Through hereditary bias or other causes 
he does not see things in their true light, sees things 
as too large or too small, estimates things out of pro- 
portion to their value as factors of life. He is almost 
sure to fall into damaging mistakes and errors. Aye! 
under conditions, it is morally certain that he will 
choose the worse for the better course, but he makes 
his choice, and is conscious of a degree of freedom in 



92 THE NEW RELIGION. 

doing SO. What awaits him of good or evil will 
depend largely Upon the degree in which he has 
placed himself in harmony^ or out of harmony with 
the moral order of the universe. 

In the early morn of your experience and in any 
stage of life, you need to go slow, walk circum- 
spectly; possibly you will need help, and a great deal of 
help which only the Heavenly Father himself can give, 
in making up your choices; and this you are free to seek. 

If appetite or passion have bound you, and you find 
it impossible to resist them, then there is but one 
hope left. 

A true contrition may break the power of sin, and so 
fortify your better nature, under the inspiration of the 
Holy Spirit, that your moral sense — your conscience — 
may yet assert and maintain authority over incompat- 
ible desires, and so give you back to love and to God. 
But nothings it is believed, but the ministry of suffer- 
ing and of love can save you. 

If there were no moral disorder there would be no 
conflict of discordant passions, no choices of the worse 
for the better part, conscience would be supreme and the 
right prevail. But, as we have had occasion more than 
once to note, moral disorder prevails. The passions 
have become discordant. They sometimes antago- 
nize conscience. Singly, or combined in their influ- 
ence, they sway the will, and hold the fort against 
conscience; but the vice of the proceeding lies in the 
sensibilities — in the affectional nature — and not in the 
will so called. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 93 

The theologian seems disposed to lay all that is 
wrong in human conduct at the door of the will. 
But, if the will is so supreme, how shall we account 
for the facts of history? 

Every consideration that reason can suggest is in 
favor of doing the right thing — conscience, honor, 
happiness, the assurance that the way of the trans- 
gressor is hard; and on the other hand everything 
warns against the wrong — disgrace, shame, suffering 
and general wretchedness; the will is supreme, and 
of course the right will be chosen and the wrong 
eschewed. 

But it is not. Some quenchless thirst or passion 
flames up, and for the moment so intensifies desire for 
gratification as to sweep the field of other motives, 
and carries the will against all the protests of 
conscience. 

The appetites and passions do not depend upon the 
will for their peculiar force, and are not subject to 
its control. The stoics were in error. You cannot 
quench thirst and passion by a mere act of the will. 
The voice of conscience calling the soul to duty is 
hushed in the clamor of discordant passions, and life 
drifts away to sin and death. 

Theologians and legislators have assumed that 
because the will is supreme men can be good, and, if 
they be not good, they should be punished and made 
good. They tell us that sin merits punishment, that 
justice requires it shall be inflicted, that men are cor- 
rupt, that some are so corrupt if they be not deterred 



94 Jlil^ NEW RELIGION. 

and restrained by fear of punishment, they will 
become intolerable. 

This were more a gospel of hate than of goodness; 
and there are never wanting those who are ready with 
knout and bludgeon to inflict the punishment thought 
to be due to justice. 

Do you suppose that the criminal deliberately 
chooses vice, with its penalty, against virtue, with its 
award? 

For the moment, under the blinding storm of pas- 
sion, and half oblivious of the danger, and hoping, 
perhaps, he will in some way escape, he indulges his 
passion and realizes a temporary gratification. But 
he has not chosen vice on its merits. He has not 
chosen crime for the purpose of being a criminal. 

The hope of some keen gratification just in sight 
leads him on. Conscience, and all the powerful con- 
siderations that could easily be adduced in favor of 
the right, fall into the background. The coveted 
pleasure, exaggerated out of all proportion, stalks to 
the front, and he grasps it. And then, when, alas, 
too late, dire consequences. 

The theologian and the legislator say he is a 
rational being, and must be held amenable for what 
he does. Justice demands it, and, according to law, 
both in church and state, he is punished. 

But this one act, or any dozen of them, does not 
exhaust the category of his qualities — does not reveal 
the man to the depths of his nature, and below there 
is something good. Under the given conditions he is 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 95 

morally certain to make foolish choices over and over. 
The degree of his guilt, for current action, is meas- 
ured by the part he has taken in establishing these con- 
ditions; but be this great or small, he is not to be 
punished by any human tribunal for it. 

The assumed right to punish is a usurpation. 

It is very true, indeed, that men are capable of 
becoming ^^desperately wicked." There seems to 
be, in certain cases, hardly any limit to the subsi- 
dence of the moral sense — hardly any to the suprem- 
acy of devilish passion. We know too well that men 
become outrageous — intolerable; but, for several 
reasons, you cannot punish them. 

How much, would you say, should a given crime 
be punished? Say overreaching in business, or theft, 
or adultery, or murder? 

No moral philosopher or casuist has attempted to 
say, because he knows not, and cannot know. You 
know neither how to proceed, nor how far to proceed 
with your punishment. No individual, and no state, 
for the state is but the aggregate of individual life, 
is competent to punish crime in the criminal. ^^Ven- 
geance is mine, and I will repay, saith the Lord.*' 

Such means as may be found needful to protect 
society, will no doubt take the color of punishment, 
and may subserve the purposes of justice, but they 
are not to originate in a spirit of offended justice, 
and intent of retribution, but rather in the need and 
intent of self protection; and should always be tern- 



96 THE NEW RELIGION. 

pered with pity that any poor fellow-mortal could 
have been so misguided and unfortunate. 

It has been observed that some wills seem *'weak/' 
and some '^strong.'* The great Napoleon, and others, 
for that matter, have been credited with having ^^iron 
wills.'* I know of no attempt to explain these phe- 
nomena on psychological principles. That they are 
significant, and demand the attention of the moral 
philosopher, will be admitted. 

The views set forth in these pages furnish at least 
something of an explanation. 

Amid the disorder and misdirection that prevail in 
the appetitive and affectional phases of human nature, 
the will yet performs its work as the exponent of life's 
combined and complex forces. Because the appe- 
tites and passions are not properly co-ordinated, the 
functions of the will are often embarrassed. 

If the discordant sensibilities could be brought 
into habitual subordination to conscience, as they 
were clearly intended to be, there would be no failure, 
on the part of the will, to act promptly, and there 
could be no such thing as a ^'weak will.'* A strong 
will means such a co-ordination and concord of the 
sensibilities as will give a united and steady support 
to the ruling desire; while a weak will means such a 
mutual conflict and antagonism of the diverse emotions 
and desires, as to result in an unstable condition of the 
volitional status — a condition in which the least 
added motive will throw the balance of power to the 
clainis of appetite or those passions^ or haply to 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 97 

the claims of the moral sense, making them, for the 
time, available. Clear conceptions and accordant 
sensibilities make the strong will, but discordant sen- 
sibilities make the weak will. The will, however, 
remains the same responsive executive power, only 
less embarrassed in its volitions in the one case, and 
more embarrassed in the other. 

We fail to find, therefore, that the Will, considered 
as one of the powers of man's higher nature, is so 
seriously at fault as current theories make it. It is 
no fault of the will that it cannot control the affec- 
tions and make life perfect. Emotions and desires, 
which constitute the motives to action, spring from 
antecedent thoughts — from ideals presented by the 
imagination independently of the will, but they never 
fail to make their claims upon it as the one power 
which alone can secure them gratification. 

Let us, in conclusion, grant, however, that the 
damage and danger of sin might have been kept more 
in sight, that the attention might have been held more 
steadily and strongly to the incentives to right living, 
and that the obligations to duty might have been 
more warmly cherished and faithfully discharged; 
and, because these things were not done, when they 
could have been done, men often become helpless in 
the toils of sin, and are doomed to measureless suf- 
fering and woe. 

Let us not exculpate the will-power from all par- 
ticipation in the infirmity of human nature. But, let 
reason do her part, and let the appetites and affections 



gS THE NEW RELIGION. 

be subdued to the rule of conscience, and we may 
not despair of the will. The remedies, if such are to 
be found, which will sufficiently inform the reason, 
and properly readjust and regulate the affections, will 
leave little to be done to make man perfect. 

To fortify the moral sense, to strengthen the con- 
victions of duty, to intensify the feelings of obliga- 
tion, to so enshrine the ideal right, and good, and 
true, as to make the power and pull of conscience 
upon the will good against the pull and power of 
incompatible desires, — this is the desideratum. 

It remains to be considered in future pages whether 
such a consummation is possible, and if possible, by 
what agencies and instrumentalities it is to be 
achieved. Can the fibre of resolution be nerved to 
such a mastery of tendency and temptation as to 
enable one, v\^ith possible divine help, to live life 
through, ever obedient to the purposes of the lovicg 
Ail-Father? We shall see. 



It must be so, Plato — thou reasonest well, 

Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, 

This longing after immortality? 

Or, whence this secret dread and inward horror 

Of falHng into naught? Why shrinks the soul 

Back on herself, and startles at destruction? 



CHAPTER XIL 

The Life Immortal. 

If, in the foregoing discussion, any doubt has been 
raised as to the essential immortahty of the Higher 
Life, let us hasten to dispel it. 

Every one knows, or at least believes, that he him- 
self is something different and distinct from his own 
physical organism. One limb after another could be 
cut away without consciously affecting the ego. 

We cannot predicate of the physical organism the 
attributes of the spirit. 

Thought and feeling do not spring from mere mat- 
ter, however highly organized. This is frankly con- 
ceded by all scientists. Though the mind seems to 
grow with the bodily structure, and sometimes to 
decline with it, exhibiting its greatest powers at the 
period of its greatest maturity, it may be demon- 
strated that this arises from the more perfect and 
better adaptability of the instrument to its purpose. 
The best artist cannot display his skill through an 
imperfect instrument, and it does not follow that 
when the instrument becomes useless the artist has 
ceased to exist. 

A Kashmirian girl, it is said, will detect 300 shades 
of color, where the Lyonaise notices but one — so 



I02 THE NEW RELIGION. 

much depends upon the degree of perfection of the 
instrument employed. 

^'Whatever analogy/' says Dr. Alexander Wilder, 
^^may be maintained between the development of the 
psychic faculties, and the growth of the body, it does 
not, by any means, follow from such correspondence, 
that the soul did not exist prior to the bodily life, or 
that it ceases to exist upon the extinction of that life. 
Those who affect to doubt, or to deny, or to be 
unable to know, the existence of an immortal princi- 
ple in man, miserably fail to account for the higher 
experiences of human life, and sadly limit human 
hope. In the issue they have made between philoso- 
phy and nihilism, we have the chance offered us to 
look upward to God as our Father, or to wander from 
nowhere to nowhither — from the primordial chaos to 
the eternal abyss, loosing ourselves among molecules 
of material substances, with nothing whatever to 
appease any longing of the spirit. '^ 

Huxley candidly admits that ''when we appropriate 
all knowji chemical forces, we are yet at an enormous 
distance from that which constitutes life;" and Tyn- 
dall says, ''if a right-hand spiral spring movement of 
the particles of the brain could be shown to occur in 
love, and a left-hand movement in hate, we should be 
as far off as ever from understanding the connection 
of this physical matter, with this spiritual manifesta- 
tion." (Frag. Science, p. 120.) 

The ablest scientists agree in admitting that, if you 
make up your compounds from all the ascertainable 



ANTHROPOLOGY. I03 

molecular activities, you involve nothing that will 
account for the weaving of the complex tissues of the 
living organism; and how infinitely will you fall 
short, then, of accounting for will power, for thought, 
for love and conscience, without predicating an 
indwelling spirit — super-material existence. 

Bain has suggested that matter '^is a double-faced 
somewhat," having a spiritual and a physical side, 
and he has had, in this at least, a respectable follow- 
ing. But this forlorn effort to set up a man without 
a soul, breaks down on the threshold — can the same 
molecule be active and non-active, extensible and 
non-extensible, ponderable and non-ponderable? The 
involved implication is unthinkable. 

Huxley, and all the great authorities in biological 
science for that matter, admit that life is the cause of 
organization, and not organization the cause of life. 
Just what they mean by life, does not plainly appear; 
but whatever it may be, if it exist before organization 
as a cause, it may exist after it as a cause-produc- 
ing energy. It is certainly plain enough that organi- 
zation does not begin all, since there must have been 
that which began the organization, and, if it do not 
begin all, how can it end all? 

To account for human experience, we must postu- 
late an indwelling ego endowed with attributes that 
cannot be predicated of any form of organized matter. 

And this ego is so imminent, pervasive and out- 
going that the human organism hardly limits it. 
Every one is sensitive to the contiguity of bodies 



104 THE NEW RELIGION. 

when groping in the dark. If we close our eyes and 
withdraw ourselves as much as possible from external 
disturbing influences, we easily see and feel, or rather 
realize what no sense gives us. It is said that Miss 
Fancher, of Brooklyn, when in her room, blind and 
paralyzed, would tell who was at the door of the 
house, and the routes which individuals were taking 
in the streets. 

Swedenborg, we are told, had periods of trance, or 
apparent dying, in which his interior self was thought 
to be absent from the body, and in company with 
spiritual beings; and the great apostle to the Gentiles 
was once rapt into the third heavens, and declared he 
did not know whether he was in or out of the body. 

If, then, the lower sensuous self fills up the meas- 
ure of its life, and dies, the higher self, distinct and 
independent of its physical organism, may not be 
involved with it in the disaster of dissolving nature. 

The psychic man, with his power to perceive, to 
conceive, to reflect, to compare, infer, and to retain 
in memory, with his power to appreciate the beauti- 
ful, the true, the good, is capable of exploring all 
lands, and sailing all seas, and tasting all joys. His 
endowments qualify him for spirit relationship, and 
ally him to spirit existence, and make him an aggres- 
sive actor in the realm of spirit-life. 

A man, even in this time-and-space-world, is not at 
his best when gratifying his sensuous nature. When 
thought is ranging over wide fields, when sentimen, 
is quaffing her nectar at all fountains, and the will is 



ANTHROPOLOGY. IO5 

gathering her fruits in all climes — then man is at his 
best. 

The psychic life is unlike the mundane life, in that 
the latter fulfills its purposes and completes the cycle 
of its being in the present state, while the former has 
but entered upon a sphere of activity and cycle of 
being which is not and cannot be rounded up and 
closed in the present state. 

'Tis not all of life to live, 
Nor all of death to die. 

1. The attributes or powers which characterize the 
spiritual ego, if we except the will, are not dependent 
upon or limited by the physical organism for their 
activity and manifestation — they are purely spiritual 
— subjective. 

The will is usually defined as the power of choosing 
or making a choice; and in this sense it, too, is purely 
subjective and unlimited by time and space relations. 
If the real ego is thus so above and independent of 
material conditions, and in all her activities and out- 
goings, we need not fear that any changes that take 
place in the realm of the physical will prove disas- 
trous to the spirit-life. 

2. We have said that the sphere of man's activi- 
ties is not rounded up and completed in the present 
state of being. This is apparent on every hand. 

(a) He has capacities for knowledge which spurn the 
limitations of time. When death comes to the oldest, 
he has not half exhausted his powers to acquire and 
to know more. He is always cut down before he has 



Io6 1HE NEW RELIGION. 

worked out and finished his problem. He loves 
knowledge, and drinks with glad joy at its fountains, 
but drinking does not lessen his thirst. It rather 
increases it and inspires him with greater zeal in its 
pursuit, and leads him to hope for larger gratifica- 
tion. Give him loo years, and he has but fairly 
begun to explore the enchanting fields that stretch 
away into the illimitable future, and with what 
quenchless yearning does he desire to go forward. 

(b) What is true of his thought life is true of his 
affectional life. Here he gets, now and then, a 
glimpse of the truly beautiful, and he instantly feels 
that ^'a. thing of beauty is a joy forever. '^ 

But he is never sated, never has enough. As his 
knowledge extends and enlarges his vision, he sees 
more and enjoys more. Give him loo years and he 
still yearns for deeper draughts of this ^^joy forever," 
of which he knows he has had, in the present state, 
but a taste. 

(c) Take love and friendship. What a heaven 
they open up in the soul. How they bless the home 
and society and the world. How they sweeten all 
life's pleasures. One hundred 3^ears of life fly away 
— have love and friendship grown old and wan? Have 
they lost their power to charm and to bless? Do 
they sate you? Can you believe that at the end of 
of your loo 3^ears, you will have done with them? that 
they will no longer be gracious and inspiring? A 
dear and cherished friend is taken away. Do you 
follow him to the grave and then willingly let him 



ANTHROPOLOGY. IO7 

vanish into nothing? Have your friendship an^^ your 
love also died? Or, rather, have they not already 
overleaped the barriers of time and gone to the 
immortal blessed? 

(d) Take sympathy — fellow-feeling — which is 
indeed but another form of love. How sweet and 
beautiful and inspiring! Will it be less at the end of 
100 years? Does it seem adapted only to a world 
where it is so checked and hindered by mistake and 
ingratitude? Could love, in all its forms, think you, 
find blessed ministries and fruition in the sun-bright 
clime 

"Where the wicked cease from troubling, 
And the weary are at rest?" 

(e) We talk of the ^ -feast of reason" and ^^flow of 
soul." The simile is a bad one. A feast is followed 
by satiety, and even nausea and disgust, if pushed 
too far. But the so-called feast of reason never palls 
upon the palate. You bless the glad moment when 
it begins. You could wish it might never end. Is it 
possible, think 3^ou, only in this world, where com- 
plete congeniality is a rare exotic, where greed and 
selfishness are always engendering bitterness and 
hate, and spoiling all such feasts? 

As you drop out of your experience, more and 
more, the things that are of the ^^earth-earthy," and 
as you rise, more and more, into the things that are 
of the spirit-spiritual, how about the blessedness of 
these feasts of reason, say in the poet's ^^Land of 
Beulah?" 



I08 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Are they suited more to the real earth or the real 
heaven? 

Buddhism to the contrary notwithstanding, a state 
of conscious-sentiment-throbbing-activity, is infi- 
nitety preferable to a state of unconscious rest. The 
difference is the difference between being and non- 
being. 

We have had occasion to criticise the accepted 
definition of will, as a mere faculty or power of 
choice, in that, a preference or choice is but a condi- 
tion precedent to volition proper. A mere prefer- 
ence ends with itself, and does not bring things to 
pass, whereas a full-fledged volition employs means 
and moves things. In the present state, this moving 
things — bringing things to pass — is a difficult, much 
embarrassed labor; and to the extent that volition 
involves this labor, it is weighed down and hindered 
by the physical. 

But, emancipated from this weighing and hinder- 
ance, it would execute and bring things to pass with 
the facility and rapidity of thought itself. 

It would seem quite clear, then, that the sphere of 
the will's best activity lies more appropriately in the 
future and unembarrassed spiritual realm, than in the 
present physical realm. 

3. But in connection with these beginnings of the 
Higher Life, and as demanding their continuous devel- 
opment, let us note that: 

The Creator works by wholes, and not by halves or 
fractions, 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 1 09 

It is characteristic of the divine purpose and wis- 
dom to complete things. The seasons come and go, 
each in its appointed time — spring, summer, autumn, 
winter. Each fulfills its mission and passes. In the 
minute germ of the acorn we have the potency of the 
oak complete. The tree does not produce its fruit in 
halves. 

Insect and animal life repeats itself, more or less 
quickly, but with substantial fidelity, through all 
their millions and myriads. The dove that flew from 
the ark of Noah, is the dove that sits and coos at 
your window. Each had its sphere of activity — its 
rounded life. 

The world-life of man himself fulfills its functions 
and ends. Could he be reborn, all his appetites and 
propensities would repeat themselves to the hun- 
dredth generation. The animal organism is a won- 
drous microcosm. Within it are hundreds of appoint- 
ments, bones, muscles, nerves, organs, appetites, 
tastes, emotions, passions, each havmg its part to 
play, and each playing it part through to the end. 
There is nothing essentially wanting, nothing in essen- 
tial excess in all this co.nplex of wholes. 

In the disorder and infirmity that prevail, affecting 
both the lower and the higher nature, we do indeed 
observe some deficiencies, some excesses; but these 
are clearly not in essence. They are not included in 
the ideal being. They are to be corrected. They do 
not inhere in the essence and nature of the human 
constitution, 



no THE NEW RELIGION. 

In the wide domain of nature there is nothing for- 
tuitous, nothing left to chance. There are no breaks 
nor disjoints. Everything is rounded up to comple- 
tion — has its mission and its goal. 

But we have just seen that, as to man's higher life, 
the sphere of his possible activities is in no sense com- 
pleted in the present state. His knowledge is not 
complete. His affections have just awakened to con- 
scious activity. His will struggles in its fetters, and 
only waits for death to strike them off. On this high 
plane of being everything needs wider range and 
larger opportunity. Everything stretches away into the 
illimitable future for such range and such opportunity. 

But, if death indeed end all, then what mean these 
inevitable, ghastly fractions of spiritual life? If 
death end all, why was the soul endowed with such 
powers of conscious adaptation to an endless future? 
If death end all, the power or capacity to acquire 
knowledge, to love the good and true, are cut down 
in their very spring-time — the joy of knowledge, the 
joy of love and sympathy are blasted in the bud. 

It cannot be. All the analogies are against it. 
The divine wisdom and benevolence displayed else- 
where in nature, are against it. God works by wholes. 
He rounds up and finishes things, and the sphere of 
the higher life must be a whole; it ca^inot be a fraction. 
But a fraction it would be, and a very infinitismal 
cne, too, if death end all. 

•'Know, all know, know infidels, unapt to know, 
Tis immortality your nature solves." 



ANTHROPOLOGY. Ill 

3. But there is another consideration of interest 
touching this subject. 

The all-bountiful, benevolent Creator responds to 
all hungering and thirsting, to all legitimate desire 
and yearning. 

And why not? Would it be a reasonable and right 
thing to do to implant appetites and passions, to 
beget hungerings and thirstings which could not be 
appeased? The eternal God is good, he would not do 
this. He is said to be love itself — that is, love is his 
dominant characteristic, his governing motive. But 
love could not sanction such an exercise of creative 
power. 

Hunger is a keen sense of want and yearning for 
food. Is not food provided in kind, and supplied in 
abundance? 

The beneficient Creator, who gave hunger, also 
gave food. 

Thirst — how it cries for water! He who gave thirst 
also gave water to quench it. 

Did not he who gave the eye give it light? 

The blood coursing through every vein, and throb- 
bing in every artery, needs instant and continuous 
purification. It must have oxygen, on pain of speedy 
strangulation and death. Behold an ocean of atmos- 
pheric air yielding the needed momentary supply, 
through highly wrought and delicate instrumentali- 
ties, and sustained for 100 years, without the anxiety 
of a moment or the trouble of a thought on the part 
the creature. 



112 THE NEW RELIGION. 

So constant is the response to urgent need and 
yearning, in all nature, that the evolutionist has found 
in the need itself, the provision for supply. The 
mole, born to live in the dark, needs no eyes, and has 
none. The eye speedily adjusts itself to more light, 
and to less, according to its needs. The stalwart 
elephant, built solidly up from the ground, needed a 
flexible proboscis with which he could collect his food 
from below and above, and in the process of evolu- 
tion a proboscis appears. The kingfisher needs a 
peculiar bill and neck and other adjustments to 
enable him to procure his food from beneath the 
water's surface, and nature responds with the needed 
outfit; and so on, throughout all realms of life, physi- 
cal and spiritual. The yearning spirit presides over 
and directs the building bioplast, determines the 
make-up and completes the adaptation to the envi- 
ronment and prepares for the exigencies of life. 

Without being able to follow the evolutionist to his 
conclusion, we must grant that supply responds to 
need with so much regularity and certainty that it 
may be relied on as a law of nature, or a law of God, 
as you may please to put it. 

This law is so well established in every domain of 
nature that, if you should realize an abiding legiti- 
mate want and desire for anything, you may feel sure 
that somehow, somewhere, the thing so desired will 
be forthcoming — that, whether you know it or not, 
the provision for appeasing such desire and want has 
already been made by the all-bountiful Creator. 



ANTHROPOLOGY. I 1 3 

All men yearn for continued life. And this yearn- 
ing is persistent and intense. 

The love of life is the strongest passion of the 
human soul. Whether life is ^ 'worth living" or not, 
as some have questioned, it is clung to with instinct- 
ive, uncontrollable desire. To avoid death any sane 
man would quickly give up every other conceivable 
good. Every possible good is less to him than life, 
without which there could be no personal good. If 
death, then, is to end all, why this quenchless yearn- 
ing for continued life? 

''The day-old infant goes straight to the breast 
where its nourishment lies. The panting roe hunts 
the water-brook. Even the sunflower turns to the 
sun. Are they deceived? A deeper impulse draws 
us. Shall we, of all things living, follow to find but 
a phantom — a fountain without water, a breast with- 
out nourishment, a sun without beams, a mirage of 
of illusive promise?"^ 

There is not a sentiment of man's nobler nature, 
whether it be the joy of being, the love of knowledge, 
the love of the good, the pleasure of friendship and 
the high pleasures of love itself, as manifested in the 
thankfulness and gratitude — not a capacity or power 
which, in its aspirations, does not overleap the limits 
of the world-life. A wider range and larger oppor- 
tunity, more light, and a less embarrassing environ- 
ment — how imperatively needed, if anything worthy of 

J. Bishop R, L. Foster. 



114 THE NEW RELIGION. 

his great powers is to be achieved. The wider realms 
of spirit-life stretch away into the illimitable, and every 
thinking soul yearns with inesxpressible desire to go 
forward to the higher passibifities wJiich await and wel- 
come his coming. Shall fruition be denied him? 
Have we found an exception to the law that reigns in 
all realms? Is this, the most impassioned cry of 
want, not to be heard? Is man, the noblest concep- 
tion of the All-Father, to come but to the birth and 
die? 

It cannot be. The eternal law of God and nature 
is against it. Give us the life immortal and all 's 
perfect, all harmony — all means are suited to all ends. 
Human life is a benediction and a heaven possible. 

As a matter of fact, all men have assumed the 
immortality of man. Without it, half his instincts 
and aspirations would be an inexplicable riddle. It 
is in all the philosophies, in all the religions, Egyp- 
tian, Brahmin, Buddhist, Roman, Greek, Judaic and 
Christian. There can be nowhere found a philo- 
sophical tenet or religious doctrine so generally 
accepted. And its disproof, were it possible, would 
fall as a pall of despair upon the race. 

The conviction that the soul cannot die, though for 
the most part untaught, is so general that it must be 
regarded as an instinct — an intuition, as if the benevo- 
lent Creator had fixed this assurance in his children, 
to encourage and sustain them amid the breaks 
and disappointments of the present state, and enable 
them to trust in a better state of being, to which all 



ANTHROPOLOGY. 1 1 5 

questions of right and justice may be referred for 
final adjustment. 

In view of such considerations, nothing, perhaps, 
could add to the strength of our convictions on this 
subject, except possibly an actual and properly 
authenticated resurrection from the dead. In the 
face of dissolving nature, and the ubiquitous reign of 
death, under which men live, it seems yet possi'Ble 
for men to doubt and shrink back. In the world* s 
history there have been few, probably, who could not 
have been helped by ocular demonstration of the 
fact of a resurrection. 

If the claims of Christianity be granted — if tlie 
Evangelists have told us a true story, this demonstra- 
tion has been made. Jesus, the Christ, we are 
assured, actually raised Lazarus and others from the 
dead. He himself, ^^a son of man," was crucified, 
dead, and buried. His resurrection from the dead, 
so well attested in the face of doubt and determined 
opposition, demonstrated to visual sense and per- 
sonal consciousness, the fact that death does not end 
all, that it did not, at least, in his case. The Roman 
soldier was pitted against the angel, but was no 
match for him. The son of man ''led captivity 
captive." 

*'He burst the bars of death, 
And triumphant rose." 

I go, he said, in the tropical phrase of the East, to 
prepare a place for you. I am brother to you all. I 



Jl6 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ascend, as you shall hereafter understand jnore per- 
fectly, to my Father and to your Father, to my God 
and to your God. 

Death does not end all. Man cannot be holden of 
death. 

"The dewdrop slips into the shining sea." 

— Light of Asia. 



PART II. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Historical Justice, 

It IS a great error to suppose there is nothing good 
to be found in the Old Religions — that the ^ ^heathen/' 
whose degradation we so commiserate, are utterly 
vicious and corrupt. 

They have been believed to be '^judicially damned/ ^^ 
and the theory that they cannot be saved from the 
horrors of an endless hell, without a knowledge of 
Christ, and faith in his atoning blood, has been the 
inspiration of the self-sacrificing missionary since the 
Council of Nice in the fourth century. Are not men 
saved by faith in Christ, and ''how can they believe 
on him of whom they have not heard?'* 

The fact that under the moral and religious cultus 
ot the Egyptians, the Indians, and especially the 
Greeks and Romans, men made great progress in the 

I. Watson's Theological Institutes. 



Il8 THE NEW RELIGION. 

arts and sciences, and civilization, before the dawn- 
ing of the Christian dispensation, is almost wholly 
ignored by very many of the votaries of the New 
Religion; and the truly pitiable condition of the 
lower and more ignorant classes of heathens, is taken 
as the exponent of all so-called heathenism and 
paganism. 

A strange fatuity, it would seem, must affect men 
who can shut their eyes against the evidences of their 
high culture in philosophy, in government, in lan- 
guage, in art and science. 

Their philosophical theories, their codes of morals, 
and their religions, respectively, give ample proof 
that the old masters of thought were profoundly sen- 
sible, as we yet are,* of the manifold imperfections of 
men, and they diligently sought how they might best 
be helped and saved. 

That profound scholar and philosopher. Max 
Mueller says: 

^'No judge, if he had before him the worst of crimi- 
nals, would treat him as most historians and theolo- 
gians have treated the (old) religions of the world. 
Every act in the lives of their founders, which 
shows they were but men, is eagerly seized and 
judged without mercy. Every doctrine that is not 
carefully guarded, is interpreted in the worst sense 
that it will bear. Every act of worship that differs 
from our own way of serving God, is held up to ridi- 
cule and contempt; and this is not done by accident, 
but with a set purpose. * * * The result has been * 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. II9 

a complete miscarriage of justice, an utter misappre- 
hension of the real character and purpose of the ancient 
religions of mankind; and, as a necessary conse- 
quence, a failure in discovering the peculiar features 
which really distinguish Christianity from all the 
religions of the world, and secure to its founder his 
his own peculiar place in the history of the world — 
far away from Vasishtha, Zoroaster and Buddha, — 
from Moses and Mohammed, from Confucius and 
Laotz. * * There are people who, from mere igno- 
rance of the ancient religions of mankind, have 
adopted a doctrine more unchristian than any that 
could be found in the pages of the religious books of 
antiquity — namely, that all the nations of the earth, 
before the rise of Christianity, were mere outcasts, 
forsaken and forgotten of their Father in heaven, 
without a knowledge of God, without a hope of 
heaven/' 

^^If we believe,-' he continues, ^^that there is a 
God, and that he created heaven and earth, and that 
he rules the earth by his unceasing providence, we 
cannot believe that millions of human beings, all 
created like ourselves, in the image of God, were, in 
their time of ignorance, so utterly abandoned that 
their whole religion was a falsehood, their whole wor- 
ship a farce, their whole life a mockery."^ 

The conspicuous error of Christian people has been 
the assumption that heathens and pagans are so 

I. Science of Religion, p. 102. 



I20 THE NEW RELIGION. 

utterly depraved and corrupt, that all improvement, 
without the aid of the Christian Gospel, is impossible. 

The Virtue of Knowledge, 

We have had occasion already to note how the 
intellectual powers have, all through the ages, been 
exalted and overestimated as factors of human 
experience; and, in accord with this persistent mis- 
conception, the efforts put forth for bettering human 
life were directed by the early masters, chiefly as 
they are even yet, to the cultivation of the intellectual 
powers. 

The theory that makes ignorance the cause or 
source of all vice, has had long and wide acceptance. 
Socrates and Zeno emphasized this doctrine, but it 
was taught by the Egyptians, and became a tenet of 
Brahminism long before these great masters were 
born. 

Socrates, especially, and with great force of argu- 
ment, insisted that if men did but know what is 
right, they would gladly do it. Often they know but 
imperfectly, if at all, what is right — more frequently 
they have considered neither the good that must 
spring from right-doing, nor the evil that must come 
from wrong-doing, in their respective and ever-widen- 
ing results; for, if they could see all and know all, 
there then would be found every motive for the one, 
and no motive for the other. Men prefer the right 
when they see it clearly in its beauty and blessedness 
— in its hallowed and far-reaching consequences, and 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 121 

seeing it thus, they would be held to the practice of 
virtue as the needle tc the pole. 

On the other hand, if men were even indifferent to 
the right, but could yet see and comprehend the 
wrong in its repulsiveness and dire consequences, it 
must fill them with aversion and horror, and effectu- 
ally prevent them from either practicing it, or con- 
senting to it. In deciding as to what is right and 
wrong in human conduct, one is not to simply follow 
custom and prescription. What accords with truth 
and justice — this, one's own moral sense sanctions as 
right, and hence, to determine the right, one must 
appeal to reason and his consciousness of the right, 
and follow his convictions. 

This is substantially and briefly the argument of 
the great philosopher. 

On this theory, of course, the ethical requirement 
is to educate, and by all possible means to enlighten 
men as to what is right in human conduct, and all this 
ado about ^ Sprayer" and ^ 'faith, "about moral sentiment 
and religious obligation, is a waste of energy, and 
is fitly characterized as ''zeal without knowledge." 

"If the child of a king," says Menu, "is exposed, 
and brought up as an outcast, he is an outcast. But, 
as soon as a friend tells him who he is, he not only 
knows himself to be a prince, but he is a prince, and 
succeeds to the throne of his father" — he had lost 
his place and right as a prince through ignorance, he 
has recovered them through knowledge.* 

* Ten Great Religions, Vol. 2, p. 178. 



122 THE NEW RELIGION. 

'^Goodness," says the same authority, '^is disclosed 
to be true knowledge. * * Let every Brahmin 
consider with fixed attention all nature, both visible 
and invisible, as existing in the divine spirit, for 
when he contemplates the boundless universe exist- 
ing in the divine spirit, he cannot give his heart to 
iniquity."^ 

This exaggerated estimate of the ethical value of 
knowledge is discernable even in the history of the 
Christian church, where we should least expect to 
find it, as appears in the importance attached to 
creeds and forms of belief, and especially in the per- 
secutions for error or heresy, which have so disgraced 
the cause of Christianit}^ 

In the order of sequence, and as a matter of fact, 
knowledge must precede sentiment. But some- 
how the sentiment or attendant feeling is, often, out 
of all proportion with the inherent value of the 
object conceived or known — the knowledge, for 
instance, of how one may attain wealth or office or 
honorable distinction, will give rise to a tempest of 
feeling, and call forth efforts out of all proportion 
with the value of the thing sought. 

Did everything give rise to so much, and only so 
much feeling as is right and proper in itself — as it 
would, in a state of ideal perfection — then this theory 
of the supremacy of knowledge would probably hold 
true in its ethical relations. 

I. Anthology, p. 8i. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 23 

But when there is a predisposition, arising from 
whatever cause, and accounted for as it may be, to this 
irregular, erratic manifestation of sensibility — such 
as we know to exist in the present state of being, 
ignorance is not the whole evil, nor is knowledge the 
whole remedy. 

The thought of getting gain ought to excite a rea- 
sonable effort to acquire it, but in some cases — 
they are very few, it is true — it scarcely moves a 
muscle, while in others — and these cases are very 
numerous — it explodes an inordinate passion, and 
precipitates all the forces of life upon an object alto- 
gether unworthy. 

There are some defects in the present constitution 
and life of man which no amount or kind of knowledge 
can remedy. The reason can only reach to and 
restrain the appetites and passions through the moral 
sense, or conscience, and the will. To do the right 
in any given case, the moral sense must hold the will 
against all antagonistic appetites and passions. The 
authority of conscience, enforcing the antecedent 
judgment of the reason, must reign supreme. This it 
cannot, or, at least, does not always do. 

The passion for money alone outweighs, in many 
cases, all that reason can throw into the scales on the 
side of conscience. Avarice and ambition may com- 
bine to influence the will against the claims of the 
moral sense. The pleasures of the banquet, the 
desire of elegant ease — otium cum digiiitate^ — the fasci- 
nations of dress and love of display may unite with 



124 THE NEW RELIGION. 

avarice to hold the citadel of the soul against reason 
and conscience; or, the sexual passion may kindle the 
lurid flames of devouring lust, or the insatiate thirst 
for strong drink, or some other intoxicant, too often 
avails to intensify the appetite with unquenchable, 
over-mastering hunger. What then? Will any kind 
or amount of knowledge appease the morbid appe- 
tite, or quench the fires of lust? 

It must be noted that in many of these cases the 
wrong on the one side, and the right on the other, 
are patent and well understood by the parties to the 
practice. They know that nothing but a very short- 
lived gratification can come from doing wrong, that 
harm and evil must come of it, that to do the right 
thing would be much the best thing for them in the 
end, and yet, the grip of passion upon the will is 
maintained. 

''Video meliora proboque 
Deleteriora seguar.'' — Ovid. 

So far, indeed, is knowledge from serving as an 
infallible check upon vice, that it too readily lends its 
power to the cause of vice against virtue, and becomes 
a wily abettor of crime by opening up new fields of 
forbidden pleasure, and aiding the criminal in his 
dexterous villainy. 

What the Brahmin prince needed under his con- 
ditions, and in his particular emergency, was the 
knowledge that he was born a prince; but note, the 
wayward soul needs more than the knowledge of a 
fact that can be communicated. He needs a read- 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 25 

justment of his moral nature. He needs a rehabili- 
tated conscience. He needs love re-enthroned among 
the affections, and it does not appear that any amount 
or kind of knowledge would be a remedy. Some- 
thing to fortify the conscience, something to redis- 
tribute and redirect the moral forces, if such a thing 
be possible — this is what he needs. The salvation of 
the prince was a small matter as compared with the 
salvation needed to bring men to ideal perfection. 

It must not be questioned, however, that the right 
kind of moral teaching, especially in the plastic 
periods of childhood and youth, is of the utmost 
importance, as an aid to virtue. There is doubtless 
a sense in which ^^virtue can be taught." A clear 
knowledge of the truth touching the obligations 
incumbent in all the relations of life may have the 
effect to fortify conscience to develop the better 
nature, to guard against vice, however powerless it 
may seem in certain cases; and this is the kind of 
knowledge upon which Socrates, in common with all 
the old masters, relied, and the general correctness 
of their ethical teaching cannot be questioned. 

The Egyptian Code of Morals, 

^^We are not obliged," said Renouf, ^^to believe 
that this or that man possessed all the virtues ascribed 
to him, but we cannot resist the conviction that thq 
recognized Egyptian code of morality was a very 
noble and refined one;" and, in confirmation of this, 
he adds: ^'The translators of the bible and the early 



126 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Christian literature, who were so often compelled to 
retain Greek words for which they could find no suita- 
ble equivalent, found the native Egyptian vocabulary 
amply sufficient for the expression of the most deli- 
cate notions of Christian ethics.'* 

^'None of the Christian virtues," says Chabas, 
*^are forgotten in the Egyptian code — piety, gentle- 
ness, charity, self-command in word and action, 
benevolence toward the humble, chastity, the protec- 
tion of the weak, deference to superiors, respect for 
property in its minutest details, all expressed in 
extremely good language. '^^ 

^^We are acquainted with several collections of pre- 
cepts and maxims in the conduct of life. Such are 
the maxims of Ptahotep, * the instruction of 
Amenemhat and the maxims of Oni. * * The 
most venerable of them is the work of Ptahotep, 
which dates from the age of the pyramids, and yet 
appeals to the authority of the ancients. It is 
undoubtedly, le plus Ancien libre de Monde — the most 
ancient book of the world. 

^^The manuscript at Paris which contains it, was 
written centuries before the Hebrew language was 
born. The author of the work lived in the reign of 
Ossa-Talkara, and the fourth dynasty. The books 
are similar in character and tone to the book of 
Proverbs in our bible. They include the study of 
wisdom, the duty to parents and superiors, respect for 
property, the advantages of charitableness, peace- 

I. Ten Great Religions, part 2, p. 309. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 27 

ableness of conduct, of liberality, of humanity, chas- 
tity and sobriety, of truthfulness and justice. And 
they show the wickedness and folly of disobedience 
and strife, of arrogance and pride, of slothfulness, 
intemperance, unchastity and other vices. *'^ 

Some of the ancient nations of India, though 
widely separated from the Egyptians in place and 
time and character, were not wanting in teachers of 
good intelligence and high moral culture. 

The Brahmin Code, 

This code of morals was very elaborate and specific 
in its requirements. 

'^A wise man must faithfully discharge all his 
moral duties, even though he does not constantly 
perform the ceremonies of religion/' which was in 
fact quite another thing. ^*He will fall very low if 
he performs ceremonial acts only, and fails to dis- 
charge his moral duties."^ 

Among the duties named in this code are, con- 
tentment, returning good for evil, resistance to sen- 
sual appetites, abstinence from illicit gain, purifica- 
tion, control of the senses, knowledge of the sacred 
writings, veracity and freedom from anger. ^^Let 
a man continually take pleasure in truth, in justice, 
in purity. Let him keep in subjection his speech, 
his arm, his appetite. Wealth and pleasures repug- 
nant to law let him shun — even lawful pleasures which 

1. Renouf, in Hibbert Lect., 1879. 

2. Anthology, p 3. 



128 THE NEW RELIGION. 

may cause future pain, or be offensive to mankind. 
Let him not have nimble fingers, restless feet or 
voluble eyes. Let him not be crooked in his ways, 
nor flippant in his speech, nor intelligent in doing 
mischief. Let him walk in the paths of good men."^* 

The Buddhist Code, 

This is not less specific and elaborate. 

Buddhism was a revolt against the system of caste 
so persistently taught and relentlessly practiced by 
the Brahmins. But these two systems are closely 
allied, in their moral teaching, if we except the sub- 
ject of caste. 

Let us note the following as indicating, in the 
briefest way, the wide range of their moral precepts, 
and the infinite details of their ethical teaching. 

There are three sins of the body: i. Murder; 
2, Theft; 3, Impiety. 

I. Ibid, p. 7. 

* There are twelve books of Menu. 

The first reveals a cosmogony, or generation of the world. 
The second and third regulate education and marriage. 
The fourth treats of economics and morals. 
The fifth treats of diet, purification and women. 
The sixth treats of devotion. 

The seventh of government and the military class. 
The eighth of private and criminal laws. 
The ninth treats of the commercial and servile classes. 
The tenth of mixed classes, and gives direction for their duties. 
The eleventh treats of penance and expiation. 
The twelfth of transmigration and final beatitude. — Oriental 
Religions, p. 179. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 29 

There are four sins of speech: i, Lying: 2, Slan- 
der; 3, Abuse; 4, Unprofitable Conversation. 

There are three sins of the mind: i, Covetousness; 
2, Malice; 3, Skepticism. 

'There are also five other evils to be avoided: 

1, Drinking intoxicating liquors; 2, Gambling; 3, Idle- 
ness; 4, Improper Associates; 5, Frequenting places 
of Amusement.^ 

^*There are difficult things in the world, '^ said 
Buddha, *^^Being rich and great, to be religious; being 
poor, to be charitable; to escape destiny; to repress 

I. Ten Great Religions, Vol. 2, p. 403. 

* Buddha gave five precepts for all men: i, Not to kill; 

2, Not to steal; 3, Not to commit adultery; 4, Not to lie; 5, Not 
to be drunken. 

Five for professed disciples: i, To abstain from food out of 
season; 2, From dances and music; 3, From personal ornaments 
and perfumes; 4, From soft and luxurious couches; 5, From 
money. 

To those farther advanced in the religious life he enjoined 
twelve ordinances: i, To wear only rags cast away by men of 
the world; 2, To wear only of these rags sufficient to serve as a 
short skirt, a night shirt and a cape; 3, Of these to wear the cape 
only on one shoulder; 4, To live only on alms; 5, to take only 
one meal a day; 6, And that before noon; 7, To live in solitary 
places, and only to enter a town to ask alms; 8, To take no shel- 
ter except the foliage of trees; 9, To take rest at the foot of a tree; 
ID, To sleep the, back against the tree without lying down; 
II, Not to mov^i the carpet from place to place; 12, And to medi- 
tate nightly among the tombs on the transitoriness of aU human 
things. — Baring Gould, Religious Beliefs, p. 340, 



130 THE NEW RELIGION. 

lust and regulate desire; to see an agreeable object, 
and not desire to obtain it; to be strong without 
being rash; to bear insult without anger; to move in 
the world without setting the heart on it; to investi- 
gate a matter to the bottom; not to contemn the 
ignorant; thoroughly to extirpate self-esteem; to be 
good, and, at the same time, learned and clever; to 
see the hidden principle in the possession of religion; 
to attain one's end without exultation; to exhibit, in 
a right way, the doctrine of expediency; to be the 
same in heart and life, and to avoid controversy."^ 

Other Codes. 

Confucius, the Chinese law-giver, whose precepts 
have had a more distinct and wider acceptance than 
those of any other teacher, had many just views on 
the relations and conduct of life. 

Being asked, ^^Is there not one word which may 
serve as a rule for one's whole life?" he replied: ^'Is 
not reciprocity such a word?" 

^'What you do not wish done to yourself, do not to 
others. When you are laboring for others let it be 
with the same zeal as if it were for yourself." 

He constantly emphasized the duty of humility, 
and no master ever so succeeded in enforcing the 
duty of filial obedience as did he, — so closely did he 
approach to the best precepts of Christianity. 

In Greece and Rome, as elsewhere in the ancient 
world, morality and religion are different things. 

I. Anthropology, p. 171. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I3I 

The Romanes religious duties were prescribed for 
him with the greatest exactness, and to the last detail 
— what God he was to worship, in what way, with 
what words. All this was definitely settled by ancient 
tradition. 

In these particulars, too, he was excessively 
punctillious; whereas he was entirely unconcerned as 
to the state of his soul. He was deemed most religious 
who best knew the ritual, and most exactly observed it.^ 

All are familiar with the teaching of the Greek and 
Roman masters — Socrates, Plato, Zeno, Seneca, 
Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and many others, to 
which the founder of Christianity could add little more 
in the way of moral precept than the sanction of his 
great authority and the inspiration of his spotless life. 

Thus it is. The wide range of thought in the vari- 
ous fields of duty, traversed by these ancient worthies, 
living 400 to 1,000 years, or even more, before the 
Christian era, and the intelligent views expressed, 
leave us little to claim as modern in the sphere of 
practical ethics. 

But, after all, it must be admitted we have looked 
on the bright side of this picture. These glittering 
gems of moral science have been dug up, and washed 
out, from an immense mass of repulsive crudities, and 
absurd, not to say disgusting, superstitions. 

The masses of men in all countries, and in all the 
world' s history, have had little conception of the higher 
life and possibilities of human nature. In the world's 

I. Ullman Conf. Chris, and Heathenism. 



132 THE NEW RELIGION. 

wide waste there stands here and there a solitary 
mountain stretching itself toward heaven; its tower- 
ing summit has caught the gleam and glitter of the 
stars. The moon sheds her pale light upon it, and 
the coming day touches it with more resplendent 
hues, while around its deep, broad base there reign 
night and desolation. Scattered throughout the 
ancient world there are to be found a few of stronger 
vision and larger power— the sons of God. They 
stand above the wide-spread plain and waste of 
humanity. They have caught the light and felt the 
inspiration which never comes to those below. They 
have called down to the multitude to follow them, but 
called in vain. Around these Himalayas there 
reign darkness and desolation; and so it would seem 
they must yet long reign. 

It is something wonderful that men who have 
attained to such heights of true knowledge — to such 
delicate appreciation of social and moral obligation — 
could yet suffer themselves to be weighted down with 
so much that seems to us absurd and degrading, and 
that their confessedly wise teaching should prove to 
be so powerless to uplift and save the masses. But 
this is human nature. If we go into those countries 
that have long been under the exclusive cultus of the 
Greek and Roman so-called Christian churches, we 
shall find ignorance and superstition and corruption 
scarcely less repulsive and degrading than those of 
pagan and heathen lands. 

One lesson seems to be plainly taught. It is, that 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 33 

education, the diffusion of knowledge, including the 
best moral precepts, is inadequate to save men. It 
cannot avail to reform and save the masses of men 
from vice and wretchedness. 

There is a conscious sense of want in men that 
appeals from what mere moral teaching cannot 
accomplish, for the saving of the soul, to a higher 
power — a power that can awaken conscience and 
readjust the affections. It is an appeal from reason 
to sentiment, from science to religion. 

Confucius was the greatest mere moral, non-relig- 
ious teacher the world ever produced. His success 
was extraordinary — phenomenal; and the result is 
peculiarly instructive, as illustrating the impotency of 
mere moral prece|)ts to uplift and reform men. His 
followers, through the ages, have failed to exhibit 
that resilliancy of spirit, that energy of thought and 
character which are the invariable con-comitants, at 
least, if not the cause of the best phases of human 
progress. 

Something of this want of energy and discursive 
activity must, no doubt, be ascribed to the debilitat- 
ing influences of a tropical climate and unfavorable 
surroundings. But these are no worse upon them 
than upon other peoples of the Orient, and yet, more 
than any other nation, the Chinese seem to have 
reached the limits of possible progress, without fun- 
damental changes in their modes of thought and cult- 
ure. They have been wanting in the inspirations of 
an uplifting religion. Their moral instincts have 



134 "^^^ ^^^ RELIGION. 

taken too low a trend. They have been wanting in 
enthusiasm. 

In the absence of a Divine Being, the source of all 
blessing, and proper object of worship, his disciples, 
when death and distance of time had lent their 
enchantment, fell down and worshiped their great 
master; or, driven by a more decidedly religious 
instinct, they have strayed away to become Tauists 
or semi-Buddhists. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

Religion Proper, 

And now, having had a glimpse of the ancient 
theories of culture and methods of moral discipline, 
as proposed and practiced by the early masters of 
thought, let us look a little more closely into their 
religions with a view of ascertaining how perfectly or 
imperfectly they respond to the legitimate needs of 
men, and their value as reformatory and uplifting 
agencies. 

Religion is necessary to a complete character. 
The religious bias or trend is an intuition, and relig- 
ion in some form, develops among all peoples. Its 
germ is born with men, and when properly developed 
it lifts the soul into fellowship with the spirits above, 
and with God. 

The first thing that impresses one upon looking 
back upon the Old Religions is their vastness and 
complexity — their immense capacities for good or evil. 

Behold their varied and manifold prescriptions for 
the religious life! Behold their rites and ceremonies, 
the sacrifices they required — the immolations and the 
self-denials! 

Behold the huge temples they builded — the shrines 
they consecrated. 



136 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Their divinities stand visaged upon mountain and 
stream, in wood and lawn, and what a role did they 
play in all the drama of that ancient life! 

As enlightened Christians we are accustomed to 
think of religion being inseparably connected with 
morality. But the votaries of religion do not always 
act on this hypothesis. 

Morals relate to the duties of man to man, and to 
society. 

Religion relates to God and the destiny of the soul 
in the hereafter. 

In the ante Christian cultus, more especially out- 
side of Egypt and Persia, morality is one thing and 
religion quite another. 

We shall fail to comprehend and properly estimate 
the Old Religions if we lose sight of this fact. 

In the religions of Greece and Rome this separa- 
tion between religion and morality was carried so far 
that the inculcation of morality at last devolved 
avowedly and exclusively upon the philosophers, 
while the priests were wholly occupied with the duties 
of religion."^ 

The time has not long gone since there were to be 
found votaries even of the Christian religion, who 
made this distinction and held this view. Their argu- 
ment was brief, but conclusive — ^^A man uncon- 
verted," they said, ^ ^without religion, is corrupt — a 
child of the devil." In this state, nolens volens, he 

I. Leckey Hist. Rat., Vol. i, p. 311. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 37 

plays into the hands of the wicked one. The more 
decently and morally he lives the greater will be his 
influence in favor of morality and against religion; 
and the more effectually, therefore, will he serve the 
devil and prevent the spread of religion and the sal- 
vation of men. I have myself frequently heard this 
argument made from the pulpit. But happily in the 
more enlightened Christian countries the time for 
such preposterous teaching is past. 

Prayer and worship are the staple constituents of 
all religions and are as universally prevalent among 
men as the religious instinct, and the sense of sin and 
ill desert. 

But, in the Old Religions, what is prayer, and 
what is worship? 

The Egyptian, 

Behold, all these living, growing, changing things, 
how wonderful! Whence did they come? They had 
a cause — a maker, where is he? He must be some- 
where back of and beyond them. To find him, to 
know him, I must look into these things, and through 
them. How else shall I ever know him? Behold the 
opening bud, the expanding flower, the climbing 
arbutus, so beautiful and inspiring; behold the leopard 
and the cat, so winsome and agile; behold the crawl- 
ing reptile gliding about in the dark depths, and 
holding perpetual vigils in the deep; how curious all 
and wonderful — inviting study ! Ah, yes — ' tis through 
these visible things we must look if we would find the 



138 THE NEW RELIGION. 

eternal — through nature up to nature's God — Thus 
the Egyptian. 

What then is the Egyptian's prayer and worship 
but an effort to commune with God, through these 
visible expressions of himself? Do we marvel to 
behold the votary of religion paying his devotions to 
these visible representatives of the Eternal. 

*^Do not think," says the Egyptian priest, ''we 
worship animals. Each of them is a symbol — a 
representative of a divine thought of the Creator; we 
reverence the Creator in his works. We do not make 
statues in the likeness of God. We take the crea- 
tures of his hand, as signifying his character. It is to 
avoid idolatry, — to avoid making anything in the 
image of God, that we place these creatures in 
shrine." 

''Such," says the author of "Ten Great Religions," 
"was the religion of the Egyptians during thousands 
of years running back into the darkness of prehistoric 
times." 

This statement of Mr. Clarke must be received 
cicm grane salts. While it is probable that the reli- 
gion of that early people had some such origin as 
above indicated, it can hardly be denied that in its 
practical working — whatever it may have been in theory, 
among a very few of the most intelligent — it bordered 
closely upon mere Fetichism. 

These visible aids to worship, yet so common and 
even popular in some quarters, have always proved 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 39 

to be futile and worse than useless as a standing 
means of worship. 

Whether among pagans or in the Christian churches, 
the ordinary worshiper cannot habitually look up 
through visible symbols to the invisible spirit — cannot 
rise ^^through nature up to nature's God.'* The 
prayer familiarly and repeatedly addressed to the 
cat or the tortoise by the Egyptian, or to the picture 
of Mary by the Roman Catholic, hardly passes 
beyond it, and tends to degrade rather than to elevate 
the worshiper. 

The Persian, 

The Persian seems to have made closer observa- 
tion of the distinction between good and evil and was 
more profoundly impressed by it. The two — good 
and evil, are everywhere to be found arrayed against 
each other, waging war. 

Now victory perches upon the banner of one, then 
upon that of the other. They are so universally and 
constantly in this relation of conflict with each other, 
and on a scale of such magnitude, extending through 
all realms, there must be divinity in them. Beyond 
the visible, both of good and evil, there must be 
eternal powers — Behold Ormuzd and Ahriman! 

By the very imminence of these mighty spirits, the 
life of the Persian was intoned to a keen and constant 
sense of danger. The conflict was ever on, and no 
moment would admit a truce. 

The religious duties of the Parsee were accord- 



140 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ingly many, and imperative. Baring Gould gives 
them as follows: Reading the law, prayer and sacri- 
fice. By prayer he guarded himself from the attacks 
of Ahriman, the principle of evil, and his attendant 
spirits. 

Prayer was made on rising from sleep and on going 
to bed, on eating and sneezing, on cutting his hair 
and paring his nails, on kindling sticks and lighting a 
lamp.^ The prayer of the votary was directed to 
good and merciful Ormuzd, to save him from the 
wiles and the power of the wicked Ahriman. 

If we go still farther Eastward, we shall find other 
peculiarities of religion. 

The Aryans. 

The Aryans of India were remarkable for their 
pensive moods, and their spiritual development. 
They seemed to stand lightly upon terra firma. 
Their thoughts readily took wing and soared away 
into realms of spirit. The battle of actual life was 
distasteful — repugnant to them, its conquests thor- 
oughly unsatisfying. 

Matter is the very essence of corruption. Every- 
thing touching it is tainted and needs purification. 
Thought was free to mount and fly, but only thought. 
All else how ^ ^cribbed and cabined." All is gross, 
groveling. Behold the beasts of the field. They eat 
and drink and care not. They care not for honor or 

I. Origin of Beliefs, p. 220. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I4I 

dishonor, for fame or shame. And behold man is a 
very beast, feeds like him, sleeps and wakes like him. 
The lofty Aryan is mortified and disgusted. Yoked 
with matter in a living organism, he 3^earns for liberty 
and for purity. Could this world, with its incessant 
and bitter strifes, its manifest disorders and its rigid 
limitations, be his home? Alas, he feels it to be his 
prison. 

And what is this physical organism that makes him 
so like a beast — what, but a body of death? And 
whence these illicit desires and vile passions? 
They appear in the beast — at best they indicate a low 
and mean nature — they must be extinguished. The 
better self must be lifted out of this grossness. O 
thou noble, high-born Aryan, dost thou know whither 
thou art tending? 

No people ever evinced such habitual disregard of 
temporal things, of business and worldly thrift. No 
people ever staked so much on religion. Behold 
Brahminism and Buddhism and Tauism, for they are 
all of one root and stem, and differ only in their 
foliage, and but little in their fruit. 

It will aid us in our inquiries as to the reformatory 
efficiency of these several forms of religion if we take 
note of their prayers and ceremonial worship. The 
Brahmin, like the worshiper of Osirib, prayed through 
symbols, at least in part, but less than the Egyptian 
did he stick and stop in the symbol. 

These Orientals were profoundly and thoroughly 
religious. They built temples and pagodas and con- 



^ 



142 THE NEW RELIGION. 

secrated shrines innumerable. All streams and lakes 
and pools were held sacred. The great Ganges the 
most sacred of all. Annually, or oftener, multitudes 
make toilsome journeys to their great temples for 
protracted prayer and worship. 

As the Divinity is localized the worshiper must be 
present on the spot. The prayers are prescribed 
forms of thought, committed to memory and repeated, 
the oftener the better; but, without the accommo- 
dating expedient of a ^ ^Rosary," I believe, which the 
Roman Catholic finds so convenient and necessary. 

The service usually is merely perfunctory, and 
might be turned off from a machine.^ 

Dr. Butler, in his '^Land of the Vedas," pages 26 
to 28, gives us a specimen morning service of one 
well advanced in religious culture, which I quote sub- 
stantially, as illustrative of the trend and scope of the 
Brahmin's religion: ^^The worshiper may bathe in 
any water from a well, but preferably from a running 
stream, and best of all in the Ganges or other sacred 
stream if the Ganges be beyond his reach, saying, 
^O Gunga, hear my prayers; for my sake be included 
in this small quantity of water.' 

I. An enterprising Llama worshiper comprehending this, 
invented his Tchu-kor, a kind of barrel turning on ."ts axis, and 
written all over with prayers, which he set going co turn off 
prayers for his benefit, while, Yankee-like, he went in pursuit of 
more lucrative business. But surely no true Brahmin, nor 
Buddhist, nor disciple of the weird Laotze, could have displayed 
such greed for this world. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I43 

^^Then, standing in the water, he must hallow his 
intended performance by the inaudible recitation of 
sacred texts. 

. '^Next, sipping water, and spurting some before 
him, he is to throw water eight times upon the crown 
of his head, on the earth, and toward the sky; then 
again toward the sky, on the earth, upon the crown 
of his head, and lastly on the ground to destoy the 
demons who wage war with the God — all the time he 
must be reciting these prayers, ^O waters, since ye 
afford delight, grant us present happiness and the 
rapturous sight of the Supreme Being. Like tender 
mothers make us partakers of your most auspicious 
essence, with which ye satisfy the universe — O 
waters, grant it to us.' 

^'Immediately after this first ablution, he sips 
water without swallowing it, silently praying. He 
then plunges three times into the water, each time 
repeating the prescribed expiatory texts. He then 
meditates in the deepest silence. During this 
moment of intense devotion he is striving to realize 
that Brahma, with four faces and a red complexion, 
resides in his bosom. Vishnu, with four arms and a 
black complexion, in his heart, and Shiva, with five 
faces and a white complexion, in his forehead! 

''To this sublime meditation succeeds a suppression 
of the breath, performed thus: Closing the left nos- 
tril with the two long fingers of his right hand, he 
draws his breath through the right nostril, and then, 
closing this nostril with his thumb, be holds his 



144 THE NEW RELIGION. 

breath while he repeats to himself the Gayatri^ and 
other texts. Last of all he raises both fingers off the 
left nostril and emits the breath he had suppressed 
through the right. 

*^The process being repeated three times, he next 
makes three ablutions with this prayer: 

<As he who bathes is cleansed from all foulness, as 
an ablution is sanctified by holy grass, so may this 
water purify me from sin.' 

^'He then fills the palm of his hand with water and, 
presenting it to his nose, inhales the fluid by one nostril, 
and, retaining it for a while, exhales it through the other 
and throws the water away to the northeast quarter.^ 

^'He then concludes by sipping water with this 
prayer: ^Water,thou dost penetrate all beings; thou dost 
reach the deep recesses of the mountains; thou art the 
mouth of the universe; thou art sacrifice; thou art the 
mystic word ^Vasha;' thou art light, taste and the immor- 
tal fluid, ' and concludes by worshiping the rising sun. ^ '^ 

1. The Gayatri is regarded as the most sacred verse of the 
Vedas. It is as follows: "Let us adore the supremacy of that 
Divine Sun — the Deity, who illuminates all, from whom all pro- 
ceed, are renovated, to whom all must return; whom we invok§ 
to direct our intellects in our progress toward his holy seat." 

2. This for internal ablution which washes away sin. — Ibid, 

3. The law of Menu adjudges the manner in which the Brah-. 
min is to eat, drink, clothe himself, relieve his bowels, wash his 
feet, cut his hair, and even perform the most secret functions, 
It designates with precision the hours of rising and going to rest. 
It tells what precautions to take for his personal safety. It 
enumerates the rights and duties peculiar to each caste and each 
divi§iQo of cc^ste, — Bmn^ Gould, Religious Beliefs, p. 206, 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I45 

It is not difficult to, discover that in this service the 
votary is burdened with a sense of impurity and sin. 
His ablutions symbolize and express what he feels 
he needs to have done for his spiritual nature. As a 
result of this purifying process he expects to obtain 
relief from his burden. 

^^O waters, since ye afford delight, grant us present 
happiness, and the rapturous sight of the Supreme 
Being. ^ Make us partakers of your most auspicious 
essence, with which ye satisfy the universe. i' 

Shall we say that such a service, however it may 
differ in its conduct, is less availing than that of the 
Christian votary, when their respective objects are so 
near of kin? That he never finds the blessing he 
seeks? 

After working one's wa}^ through the deep jungle 
of absurd ritual, and dogma, and superstitious cere- 
mony, whose object is half concealed by masses of 
symbols and tropes and Oriental imagery, it is refresh- 
ing, upon emerging, to find rising out of all prayers 
such as these: 

^^May that soul of mine which mounts aloft in my 
waking and my sleeping hours, an ethereal spark 
from the light of lights, be united by devout medita- 
tion, with the spirit supremely blest and supremely 
intelligent! 

'^May that soul of mine, the guide by which the 

I. It was believed that the Yogi — those who had made the 
highest attainments in religion, could literally see the Diving 
Spirit. 



146 THE NEW RELIGION. 

lowly perform their menial work, and the wise, versed 
in science, worship — that soul which is the primal 
oblation within all creatures, be united by devout 
meditation with the spirit supremely blest and 
supremely intelligent! 

^^May that soul of mine, which is a ray of perfect 
wisdom, pure intellect and permanent existence, 
the inextinguishable light set in mortal bodies, with- 
out which no good act is performed, be united, by 
devout meditation, with the spirit supremely blest 
and supremely intelligent! 

^'May that soul of mine, in whose eternal essence 
is comprised whatever has passed, is present, or will 
be hereafter, be united, by devout meditation, with 
the spirit supremely blest and supremely intelligent! 

^^May that soul of mine, which, distributed also 
through others, guides mankind, as the charioteer 
guides his steeds — the soul fixed in my breast, 
exernpt from old age, swift in its course, be united, 
by divine meditation, with the spirit supremely blest 
and supremely intelligent!"^ 

The following beautiful Brahmin burial service 
throws light upon their great and complex system of 
religion: 

^^O Earth! to thee we commend our brother. Of 
thee he was formed. By thee he was sustained, and 
unto thee he now returns. 

'^O Fire! thou hadst a claim in our brother during 

I, Anthology, p- 103. 



tHE OLD kELIGlONS. I47 

life. He subsisted by thy influence in nature. To 
thee we commit his body, thou emblem of purity. 
May his spirit be purified on entering a new state 
existence. 

'^O Air! while the breath of life continued, our 
brother respired thee. His last breath is now 
departed. To thee we yield him. 

^^O Water! thou didst contribute to the life of our 
brother. Thou wert one of his sustaining elements. 
His remains are now dispersed. Receive thy share 
of him who has now taken an everlasting flight!"^ 

The service outlined by Dr. Butler only hints at 
the range and character of the Oriental religious life 
— its spirit, its elaborate ritual, its numerous cere- 
monies, often seemingly very superstitious and 
absurd, but always spiritual and world-forgetting. 

We shall get a better conception of these great relig- 
ions of the Orient, considered as agencies for bettering 
the conditions of mankind, if we note even briefly their 
ascetic tendencies and requirements. How much 
soever we moderns may be inclined to think that the 
requirements and enjoyments of religion are consis- 
tent with successful business, with domestic and 
social pleasure, and adapted to make the present life 
happy, we must not expect to find such views held 
by Brahmin and Buddhist. 

Their modes of thought, their institutions, their 
environment, and of course their religious cultus, are 
profoundly different. 

I. Anthology, by Conway, p. 420. 



CHAPTER XV. 

Asceticism, 

However wisely or unwisely, this ancient cultus 
looks not so much to the needs of the present life as 
to those of the larger life beyond, to which the 
present is but an introduction. 

If the happiness of the present brief life is incom- 
patible with that of the future and eternal life, it 
were, indeed, the greatest folly to sacrifice the latter 
to the former. 

To attain an eternity of repose and blessing, at the 
expense and loss of all that can be conceived to be 
good in this life, which so hastens to its close, would 
be wise. Something of this view, it would seem, 
underlies the life of the ascetic. Asceticism is the 
offspring of the philosophico-religious views incul- 
cated by the old masters as to the nature and effect 
of matter in its organic relations with the human 
spirit. Matter fetters and debases; it is corrupting, 
and defiles the soul. Emotions and passions which 
have their root in the physical organism are destruc- 
tive of true happiness. Desire must be subdued, 
according to Buddha completely annihilated. To 
purge away the dross and defilement of matter, and 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I49 

break the power of the sensuous Hfe, is the thing to 
be accomplished. 

'^A man endued with a purified intellect, having 
humbled his spirit by resolution; who hath freed him- 
self from passion and dislike; who worshipeth with 
discrimination, eateth with moderation, and is lowly 
of speech, of body, and of mind, and who preferreth 
the devotion of meditation and who constantly placeth 
his confidence in dispassion, who is freed from osten- 
tation, tyrannic strength, vain glory, lust, anger and 
avarice, and who is exempt from selfishness and in all 
things temperate, is formed for union with God. * * 
It is to be obtained by resolution, by the man who 
knoweth his own mind, wheresover the unsteady 
mind roameth, he should subdue i"- bring it back and 
place it in his own breast."^ 

If the Divine Being be conceived of as anthropo- 
morphic, as in Greece and Rome, there is really no 
great change needed to bring the votary into har- 
mony and likeness with the object of his worship. 
Accordingly among the Greeks and Romans we find 
no expressed need of such change, no disavowal of 
existing manhood, no claim that a regeneration of 
life and character is necessary to harmony with the 
celestials, and per consequence, no conversion, no 
asceticism. If, however, the Divine Spirit be con- 
ceived of as a pure spirit, above all sensibility, and 
ineffably pure and holy, the case is very different. 

I. Anthol. p. 58, et seq. 



150 • THE NEW RELIGION. 

To bring a willful, sinning, vice-smitten, sensuous 
mortal into likeness and harmony with such an exalted 
being, great changes must be wrought in him. And 
this is the deep conviction of the consciously imper- 
fect soul. This, say, the old masters, must be done. 
The deliverance of the spirit must be effected. And, 
with this line thrown out to religious fanaticism, what 
may we not expect in the way of extremes, from relig- 
ious zealots? What has been the result? We have 
self-denial and penance ^^gone mad." 

Human nature has made no more humiliating and 
pitiful exhibition of itself than that recorded in 
the history of Asceticism, Religious convictions lie 
so deep in man's nature, and so overshadow and con- 
trol all mere world considerations that they often 
drive men into revolting extremes of folly. 

Behold the excesses and horrors of religious wars 
and religious persecutions! 

To get a proper conception of Asceticism as prac- 
ticed by the Brahmins and other Orientals, we must 
look a little into the organization of their social and 
religious life. It was not altogether a voluntary and 
sporadic development of the religious nature. 

Four stages of life are marked out by Menu, the 
great Brahmanic law-giver: 

1. The Brahmachari, or student's life of the Veda. 

2. The Grishastha, or married life stage. 

3. The Hermit life period. 

4. The Sannyassi, or Devotee period. 

Passing the first and second of these periods, in 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. t^t 

which no great amount of self-torture was required, 
let us notice the third and fourth. 

In the third, or Hermit stage, such a course of dis- 
cipline as will mortify the passions and extinguish 
desire, is the desideratum. 

'^When one has remained a Grishastha — in the 
married stage of life — until his muscles become flac- 
cid, and his hair gray, and he has seen a child of his 
child, let him abandon his household, and repair to 
the forest and dwell there as a hermit. 

^^Let him take with him the consecrated fire, and all 
the implements for making oblations to the fire, and 
there dwell in the forest with perfect control over all 
his organs. 

^'Day by day he should perform the five 
sacraments." 

He should wear a black antelope's hide, or a vest- 
ure of black, and bathe every morning and evening. 

He should allow his nails and the hair of his head 
and beard to grow without cutting, and he should be 
constantly engaged in reading the Veda. 

He should be patient in all extremities, universally 
benevolent and entertain a tender affection for all liv- 
ing creatures. 

His mind should be ever intent upon the Supreme 
Being. 

He should slide backward and forward, or stand a 
whole day upon tiptoe, or continue in motion by 
alternately rising and sitting; but every day, at sun- 



152 THE NEW RELIGION. 

rise, at noon, and at sunset, he should go to the 
waters and bathe. 

In the hot season he should sit exposed to five fires, 
viz., four blazing around him, while the sun burns 
above him. 

In the raining season he should stand uncovered 
without a mantle, while the clouds pour down their 
heaviest showers. 

In the cold season he should wear damp vesture. 

He should increase the austerity of his devotions 
by degrees until, by enduring harsher and harsher 
mortifications, he has dried up his bodily frame. ^ 

When he has thus lived in the forest during the 
third portion of his life as a Vanaprastha, he should, 
for the fourth portion of it, become a Sannyassi, and 
abandon all sensual affections, and repose wholly in 
the Supreme Spirit. 

He should take an earthen water-pot, dwell at the 
roots of large trees, wear coarse vesture, abide in 
total solitude, and exhibit a perfect equanimity toward 
all creatures. 

He should wish for neither death nor life, but 
expect his appointed time as a hired servant expects 
his wages. 

He should look down as he advances his step, lest 
he should touch anything impure. 

He should drink water that has been purified by 

I. Code iv. 22; Vishnu Purana iii. g, etc. Substantially as 
given by Dr. Butler. Land of the Vedas, pp. 35 and 36. 



THE OLt) RELIGIONS. X53 

straining through a cloth, lest he should hurt an 
insect. 

He should bear a reproachable spirit with patience. 
Speak reproachfully to no one, never utter a word 
relating to vain, illusory things, delight in meditating 
upon the Supreme Spirit, and sit fixed in such medi- 
tation without needing anything earthly, without one 
sensual desire, and without any companion but his 
own soul; and much more to the same general effect.^ 

In all this. Buddhism substantially followed Brah- 
minism. Even the Buddha himself was the subject 
of innumerable mortifying births ere asceticism had 
wrought its perfect work. 

Under such a cultus the wildest fanaticism of course 
had free play. 

Great importance was attached, by these Old Mas- 
ters, to meditation, in which they were zealously fol- 
lowed by Plato. To go into profound solitude, and 
indulge in protracted, intense, absorbing contempla- 
tion, was the supplementary and final means of 
attaining Nirwana — the condition of eternal repose. 

It was needful that they should reflect upon the 
transmigrations of men, caused by their sinful deeds, 
their downfall into the regions of darkness, their tor- 
ments in the mansions of Yama, their separation 
from those whom they love, their union with those 
whom they hate, upon their strength being over- 
powered by old age, their bodies racked with disease, 



Ibid. 



154 '^^^ ^^W RELIGION. 

their agonizing departure from this corporeal fram^, 
their formation again in the womb, on the misery 
attached to embodied spirits from a violation of their 
duties, and the imperishable bliss which attaches to 
disembodied spirits, who have '^abundantly performed 
their whole duty.'' 

Starting with asceticism thus formulated and 
organized, we have it in full chorus of horror in all 
the Orient. 

Baring Gould, in his Origin of Beliefs,^ says, 
''On the borders of the Ganges the Yogin strives by 
every exaggeration of torture to emancipate his soul 
and confound it with God. 

''Yogins swarming with vermin, covered with dirt, 
mixing filth with their food, running skewers through 
their cheeks, suspending themselves by hooks thrust 
into their flesh, standing on one foot for many 
years, lying for half a lifetime upon sharp nails, 
strive, by withdrawing their affections from things 
here below, to fix them with greater intensity on the 
Divinity above." 

It were easy to fill pages with the horrors of asceti- 
cism as practiced in Orient. 

Dr. Butler says there are 2,000,000 of these Yogin 
and Mohammedan Fakirs in India. 

But as a second result of this system of asceticism 
we have self-righteousness and pride gone mad. 

It must not be forgotten that these penances were 

I. Page 362. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 155 

considered meritorious. The devotee becomes more 
pure and holy in proportion as he pushes his self-sac- 
rifices to extremes, and in this fact lies the persistent 
strength and popularity of the system. The pious 
ascetic, under the reign, possibly, of a pure selfishness, 
sets up a claim to superior sanctity — a claim which 
he knows will be respected — and becomes the most 
haughty and supercilious of mortals. He has merited 
support, deference, adoration. He has disarmed 
criticism, risen above censure, and attained divine 
power, and must be respected even by the lower 
divinities. 

"Supreme he stood 
The merit of his sacrifice 

Was a monsoon flood. 

His good deeds numberless." 

— deeds, whose ^^merit" was so great as to compel 
gods ^^who fain would shed his heart's red blood," to 
bless them. Is it strange that under the combined 
impulses of religion and selfish ambition, thousands, 
age after age, should fall into line and swarm into 
the forests? 

It may be said indeed that this is an abuse and not 
the proper use of the system; and this, in candor, 
ought to be admitted; but, given human nature as it 
is, it can hardly be denied that it is an abuse which is 
inseparable from its use. 

What, then, must be the verdict as to the reforma- 
tory efficiency and uplifting virtue of asceticism, con- 
sidered in its means and methods? Does it make the 



156 THE NEW RELIGION. 

individual happier, or society better, or final beatitude 
more certain? 

That there is advantage in occasionally retiring from 
the hurly burly and excitements of society, into soli- 
tude, and spending an hour in self-examination and 
contemplation, we should freely admit and do believe. 

One can hardly dwell upon the shifting vicissitudes 
of this world-life, and the inevitable results of vice and 
virtue in human conduct, without coming into closer 
sympathy with that which is good and true in human 
life. To ardently cherish an ideal character, to hold 
in mind the symbols of goodness and perfection, and 
cherish with prayerful yearning the better life, can 
hardly fail to fortify resolution and give new zest and 
vitality to all virtuous and worthy purposes. 

That such devout and prolonged contemplation and 
aspiration, as Menu enjoined upon the Sannyassi, and 
Plato prescribed for his philosophers, connect with 
great spiritual possibilities can hardly be doubted; and 
we hasten to accord this meed of virtue to asceticism. 
But, just how this murderous self-denial and self-immo- 
lation, thus systematically enjoined and practiced, can 
promote human happiness in this state of being or in 
any state of being is not easy to see. 

In the first place asceticism is, at the bottom, but 
another form of selfishness. The ascetic does all, and 
suffers all, for his own ultimate benefit. He cherishes 
no philanthropy, feels no benevolence, contemplates 
n^ help for others, however needy. 

5q far from it, he does great wrong to those who are 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I57 

dependent upon him, and who have a right to look to 
him for aid aad comfort. The Grishastha, or ^^House- 
holder/' may ^^see the child of his child" at forty to 
forty-five, and while yet in the prime and strength of his 
manhood, and when he could provide for his depend- 
ent family and render important services to society. 
His wife and children, abandoned by him, may be 
quite unable to provide against hunger and want. 
Every consideration of love and justice requires that 
he should stay with them and help them. But not so, 
he must become a ^ ^hermit;" he abandons them to 
their fate! — becomes a mendicant, and henceforth 
ceases to be a producer and lives off public charity; he 
turns a deaf ear to the cries of his orphaned children 
and bereaved and possibly destitute wife, to become a 
miserable and selfish Anchorite, under pretence of 
gaining what? — beatitude for himself! 

But beyond the fact of its being essentially selfish in 
its purpose, asceticism evidently antagonizes the 
whole order of nature. It is a pure assumption that 
matter corrupts the spirit. 

What do we mean by corruption as applied to 
spirit? We cannot mean guiltiness, certainly, for 
there are innocent spirits in organic union with matter. 
Children begin life in a state of innocence. Guilt can- 
not be predicated until intentional sin has been com- 
mitted. Do we mean necessitated limitations of 
thought? imperfect appreciation of the good? 

This condition of disability can hardly be called one 
pf impunity, It is a bad use of terms, But if thi^ 



158 THE NEW RELIGION. 

torturing self-denial and self-abuse which finally 
results in destroying the body, has the effect to purify 
the spirit, why should one not cut the work short in 
righteousness and shoot himself? 

The best proof of our being good is, that we fit into 
our place, that we live as we were intended to live. 
If there be light, and eyes fitted to it, we should use 
them, and enjoy the light; if there be sound, and ears 
fitted to it, we should use them and enjoy its blessings; 
if there be food and drink, and a digestive apparatus 
adapted to them, we should heed the monitions of 
taste and appetite and enjoy them; if there be a family 
with helpless infancy, and stronger arms and wiser 
thoughts of father and mother, and an instinct that 
urges on, the strong arms should hold up and defend 
the defenceless; if there be society, the individual 
should adjust himself to it, receiving from it and giv- 
ing to it what is best for both. Desires and passions, 
when properly regulated, have their uses and adapta- 
tion. Love incites to doing good to others. F'ear 
warns against danger, the passion for money provides 
for home and comfort. The love of the beautiful, the 
true and the good is to be gratified, by beauty and 
truth and goodness. We should study God's order 
and make the best of it, instead of placing ourselves 
at cross purposes with it. The best preparation we 
can have for the life beyond is to have fulfilled the 
evident purpose of the life that is here; and the proof 
that we shall be happy hereafter is the fact that we are 
so living as to be happy now. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I59 

Human life and human happiness do not consist of 
parts and fragments. The Heaven beyond is here 
begun, and it must be substantially the same in kind 
^ ^f or aye. ' ' 

But the ascetic takes direct issue with the order of 
nature, and, at infinite cost and loss, wages an unequal 
warfare against it. He tortures himself, stifles parental 
and social affection, wickedly withdraws his sympathies 
from those who would love him, abandons dependent 
wife and children, shuts his eyes against those in suf- 
fering, turns a deaf ear to the claims of all others, to 
nurse himself. He seeks to extinguish and to crush 
out from his nature all that would go to make a man 
of him, and in doing so becomes the most forlorn and 
pitiable of mankind. Alas for religion! Alas for 
humanity! 



CHAPTER XVI. 

Fear a Motive to Virtue. 

Having glanced at some of the many and onerous 
duties imposed upon the rehgious votary by the Old 
Religions, let us consider for a moment how they 
enforce obedience in actual life. 

It is one thing to preach and point the way of duty, 
it is quite another to put precepts into practice — to 
take up the line of march and go forward. 

In all moral and religious teaching, there are pre- 
sented at least, two principal motives to the practice 
of virtue — gain and loss. Do right and enjoy, do 
wrong and suffer. 

The legislator says to the citizen, do wrong if you 
will; but if you do I will make you suffer for it. This 
is the spirit of Law everywhere. 

The mother says to her child, you are very dear to 
me. I am happy when you are happy. I suffer when 
you suffer. I cannot help it. If you should do wrong 
it would make you miserable and it would distress me. 

There are two kinds of influence brought to bear in 
favor of the practice of virtue. This is not the place 
to discuss which is the more effective. 

As a factor of virtue and piety^ fear holds an import- 
ant plage, Man, in all his relations, is a subject of 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. l6l 

law, and violated law means suffering. It is not 
necessary that we regard law as vindictive and suffering 
as punitive. It is better to think of it as preventive 
and reformatory. But the penalty is, nevertheless, 
suffering, and inspires fear. Hence fear becomes a 
motive urging men to obey law, and to obey law is to 
practice virtue. 

Some have sought to eliminate fear from the list of 
motives to virtue. They say that love should draw men 
rather than that fear should push and drive them to 
obedience. But will love always do it? and if not, 
will fear help? 

Fear is an inborn sensibility, and inseparable from 
human experience in the presence of danger. It has 
its proper function and should not be ignored either in 
ethics or religion, in the family or in the state. 

Let it once be settled and fixed that, God is not 
mocked, that whatsoever a man sows that shall he 
reap; that if he sow to the flesh he shall of the flesh 
reap corruption; and, it is easy to see, that fear will 
supplement and reinforce the purpose to sow to the 
spirit. Love and fear are here, quite in accord in 
their influence on the will, and unite to secure the 
practice of virtue. 

A just fear invigorates true love and renders it more 
powerful to combat the tendencies to vice and sin, so 
strong in human nature. The greater the temptation 
to do wrong the greater the need of fear to supplement 
and fortify the power of love as a conservator of right 
conduct, If there be danger of infinite loss, it \y?ir^ 



l62 THE NEW RELIGION. 

better to array every motive against it; and, to dis- 
place fear, as some sentimentalists seek to do, were a 
serious mistake. 

But it were a much greater mistake to ignore love, 
and rely upon fear as the principle means of securing 
obedience, as most governments and some families 
yet do. 

Under the earlier teachers of mankind, as among 
barbarous nations and barbarous families, the chief 
reliance was upon fear, as motive to obedience. 

It has been doubted whether the Egyptian Typhon 
represented moral evil. 

Mr. J. Freeman Clarke, author of ^^Ten Great Relig- 
ions," seems to think that transmigration among this 
people was not penal, but evolutional, developmental 
in its character.^ But it would be difficult to defend 
this view, and it is not generally accepted. Man was 
held to be accountable hereafter for his actions done 
in this life, and to be adjudged according to his works. 
He was to be brought before Osiris, and his heart 
'^weighed against the feather of truth." He was to be 
questioned respecting his conduct in life and especially 
as to the whether he had committed the ' ^forty-two 
sins," concernmg which his accusers inquired. 

In this court of last appeal he has no friend, no 
advocate, as has the Christian. If he can show that 
his good deeds out-weigh his evil deeds in the scales 
of exact truth and justice, Osiris will admit him to the 

I. Vol. 2, p. 175. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 163 

Islands of the Blessed; but if his evil deeds over-bal- 
ance his good ones, then woe! woe! to his poor soul! 
He must return to earth and transmigrate through 
horrid creatures in the lower ranges of life, and suffer 
all the disgusting experiences incident to their wretched 
condition; and this on and on, through cycles of such 
experience, until he can be again trusted with the privi- 
leges and responsibilities of regained human life, when 
he is permitted to start again. 

Souls cannot die. They leave a former home 
And in new bodies dwell, and from them roam. 
Nothing can perish. All things change below, 
For spirits through all forms may come and go. 
Great beasts shall rise to human forms, and men, 
If bad, shall downward turn to beasts again. 
Thus, through a thousand shapes, the soul shall go, 
And thus fulfill its destiny below. 1 

— Ovid. 

The good Isis may turn a sympathizing look upon 
the prisoner at the bar, but it avails him not, and he 
knows not what fate awaits him until the august judge 
gives sentence. Going thus into court with a sense of 
conscious guilt upon his soul (and who has not such 
conviction of guilt), he may well fear the worst. 

It is easy to see that, under such conditions of life 

I The doctrine of Metempsychosis, says Mr. Clarke, was 
taught by Pythagoras, Empedocles and Plato; by the Neo 
Platonists the Jewish Cabbala and Arab Philosophers; by Origen 
ana othei Christian Fathers, by the Gnostics and Manichians, by 
the Druids, and, in more recent times, by Fourier and others. 
Vol. 2. p. 176. 



164 THE NEW RELIGION. 

and death, fear must play a principal part among the 
motives to virtue and piety. That such anticipation 
of future desert did restrain men from vice and pro- 
mote virtue cannot be doubted. But, the civilization 
of this wonderful people, so renowned for their early 
progress in the arts and sciences, was always wanting 
in philanthropy, and some of the higher forms of sym- 
pathetic virtue, as the absence of public charities and 
the neglect of the poor and unfortunate sufficiently 
prove. No people of high moral development and 
active philanthropy could have held such crude notions 
as to the rights, social and political, of the masses, or 
such views of the divine prerogatives of the governing 
few, as the building of the pyramids imply. 

The doctrine of Transmigration was a fundamental 
tenet of Brahminism and passed into Buddhism with 
little modification; and, as in Egypt, it appealed to 
the fears of men. 

^^A priest," says the great Indian law- giver, '^who 
has drunk spirituous liquor shall migrate into the form 
of a larger or smaller worm, or insect, of a moth, or 
some ravenous animal. If a man steal grain in the 
husk he shall be born a rat; if a yellow mixed metal, a 
gander; if water, a Plava, or diver; if honey, a great 
stinging gnat; if milk, a crow; if expressed juice, a 
dog; if clarified butter, an ichneumon or weasel." 
'^As far as vital souls addicted to sensuality indulge in 
forbidden pleasures, even to the same degree shall the 
acuteness of their senses be raised in their future 
bodies, that they may endure analogous pains." 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 165 

'^Then shall follow separations from kindred and 
friends, forced residence with the wicked, painful 
gains and ruinous losses of wealth, friendships, hardly 
acquired, and at length changed into enmities."^ 

*^It may well be doubted," says Mr. J. Thomas, 
whether the comparatively vague fear of eternal pun- 
ishment, taught among the nations of the West, was 
calculated to exert so powerful an influence on the 
mind, as the definite, though infinitely varied terrors 
which these impending transmigrations inspired. "^ 
*'The mysterious doctrine of Metempsychosis," says 
William R. Alger, ^^has held the entire mind, sentiment 
and civilization of the East through every period of its 
history as with an irrevocable spell. "^ In all this Bud- 
dhism substantially follows Brahminism. The Buddha 
himself was the subject of ^^innumerable births." He 
was born as an ascetic eighty-three times, as the soul 
of a tree, forty-three times, and many times also as an 
ape, deer, lion, snipe, chicken, eagle, serpent, pig, frog, 
etc. According to a Chinese authority he was made to 
say, ^^The number of my births and deaths can only be 
compared to that of all the planets of the universe." 

Transmigration is punishment. If prayers and pen- 
ance and sacrifices — if self-torture and devout contem- 
plation fail, the punishment of transmigration must 
complete the work of purification. 

Sacrifices were offered for various purposes, but 

1. Taken from Laws of Menu, as given by Clarke. J. F. 

2. Johnson's Cyclop., p. 752, Vol. i. 

3. Ibid, p. 84, Vol. 3. 



r66 THE NEW RELIGION. 

sacrifices to appease the divine wrath and expiate sin 
were by far the most common. Under a deep sense 
of sin and personal guilt, the alarmed devotee, with 
the instinct of danger quivering in every fibre of his 
being, cries out through these acted prayers for help 
against the coming destiny, but no help comes, and 
he knows nothing of the love that '^casts out fear."^ 

Will fear put an effectual check upon sin? Will 
punishment purify the soul — mean what you will by 
purify? That it will is the implied postulate of the 
Old Religions. The history of penal servitude does 
not warrant any such hope. The well-known effect 
of punishment for crime has been to harden men, to 
destroy moral sensibility, to engender bitterness, and 
hate, to dwarf and destroy self-respect, and thus 
to weaken rather than strengthen men against 
temptation. 

Any number of facts could be produced to show 
that punishment inflicted by tribunals of justice has 
not proved reformatory and saving. The uniform 
testimony of officers in charge of penal institutions, 
both in this country and Europe, as collected by Mr. 
Wines, is to the effect that prison discipline is 

I. Not only in India, but elsewhere, men shuddered at the 
thought of this lower world. "My temples are gray," said the 
pleasure-loving Anacreon, "and white my head. Beautiful yauth 
is gone. Not much remains of sweet life. Therefore I often 
sigh, fearing Tartarus — dreadful abyss of Hades— full of horrors 
is the descent thither; and whatever has gone down there never 
returns." — Ullhorn Conflict Christ, and Heath., p. 73. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 67 

demoralizing, and the more so as the effort has been 
made to degrade men and make them suffer for their 
crimes. The treatment, says Dr. Despine, an eminent 
physician and philosopher of France, the treatment 
which aims only to punish, is dangerous both to 
society and the criminal. In France it produces from 
40 to 45 per cent, of repeaters — that is, about one- 
half of those subjected to this course of penal disci- 
pline, leave, to go out and re-enter the list of crimi- 
nals, and are again returned to prison, and, generally, 
for worse crimes than the first upon which they were 
convicted. And this proportion of ^ ^repeaters," or 
^^revolvers," as they are sometimes called, holds good 
in this country. Does clubbing a man reform him? 
Says Mr. Altgeld:^ ^^Does brutal treatment elevate 
his thoughts? Does handcuffing fill him with good 
resolutions?" There is no greater mistake (says the 
National Prison Reform Convention, by resolution at 
Cincinnati, Ohio, 1870), in the whole compass of 
penal discipline than its studied methods of degrada- 
tion, as a part of punishment. Such imposition 
destroys every better impulse and aspiration; it 
crushes the weak, irritates the strong, and indisposes 
all to submission and reform. 

Cruel treatment (says Mr. F. Wines in his work 
on Prisons), was once generally esteemed the most 
sure, just, and only fitting method of penal discipline. 
But the period is well passed when the interior of a 

I. Penal Machinery. 



1 68 THE NEW RELIGION. 

prison is to be the arena for the exercise of brutaliz- 
ing forces upon erring and wicked men. 

There is, says another/ in the history of the human 
race, not a single instance wherein cruelty effected a 
genuine reformation. It can crush, but it cannot 
improve. It can restrain, but as soon as the restraint 
is removed, the subject is worse than before. The 
human mind is so constituted that it must be led 
towards the good, and can be driven only in one 
direction, and that is towards ruin. 

This fact is clearly admitted in the so-called Chris- 
tian dogma of eternal damnation. If the invitations 
and warnings of love, and the reformatory agencies of 
the present life, where hope and liberty reign, fail to 
lead to virtue, and the subject enters upon his pun- 
ishment, there is thenceforth no possible hope for 
him; his punishment never reforms him. 

The Old Religions then have staked too much upon 
this method of saving men through fear of punishment. 
They have failed to comprehend the fact, now so well 
attested, that such a method works, not toward virtue, 
but toward vice, and is therefore utterly unsuited to 
the purposes of reformation. 

I. Altgeld. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

Want of Sympathy. 

Such are some of the principal reformatory means 
and agencies relied on by the Old Masters. 

In a spirit of fairness, I hope, we have sought to 
estimate them at their true value. 

We should not, however, be true to the cause of 
truth if we do not note at least one important fact that 
lies against them — a fact which shows how far these 
religions come short of making satisfactory response 
to the needs of men involved, as they are, in the dire 
disasters incident to human life. 

This fact is their evident want of sympathy with 
the erring and unfortunate victims of vice and 
suffering. 

"That good and ill is God's play, 

Do not our sages say? 
May they not what they make, unmake again? 

Mayhap in sport divine 

They made your blood and mine, 
May they not shed it as they shed rain?" 

One of the most obvious and most significant facts 
of history, is the fact that men do always sin. This 
must be affirmed of every age, and of all classes of 
men. Even the optimist cannot deny this. There is 



170 THE NEW RELIGION. 

no one generation, no nation, however civilized, who 
have not exhibited flagrant and repeated immorahties. 

This is a fact so constant and so obvious that it 
demands serious consideration, both by legislators 
and religious teachers and moral philosophers. 
Among all peoples there may be found good moral 
precepts, a high sense of honor and rectitude in pub- 
lic sentiment, and, here and there, admirable exam- 
ples of personal purity and virtue; but this does not 
prove that either the Republic of Plato or the Utopia 
of Sir Thomas Moore, or the scheme of Bellamy is 
possible among men. 

As to a large proportion of men, immersed in the 
cares of business, and absorbed by its excitements, 
there is, perhaps, little serious concern for moral con- 
sequences, and the desert of the future; and yet there 
are sure to come, even to these, on occasions, such 
a sense of ill-desert and unworthiness as to humble 
them in the dust. Many who are careful and solici- 
tous to do the right thing always, are nevertheless 
yet compelled to admit their failure. With Paul they 
are ready to say, '^When I would do good, evil is 
present with me." 

We know that in the dying hour, if not sooner, 
men often charge themselves with folly, and experi- 
ence an imperative need of the divine sympathy and 
compassion. 

Take men of the largest knowledge and culture — 
men of the highest virtue and most exemplary char- 
acter — do they, when facing death, do they realize no 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 17I 

need of sympathy and divine compassion? Evcii the 
dying Son of Man exclaimed, ^^My God! My God! why 
hast thou forsaken me?" 

If the wisest and the best come into such straits, and 
feel such need of appreciating sympathy, what shall 
we say of those who have been less perfect and 
fortunate in the battle of life? 

The bent to sinning seems to be universal among 
men, and sinful indulgence is as truly characteristic of 
the human race as is the capacity and Instinct of 
worship and the conviction of duty. Human life 
springs into being, and enters upon its vicissitudes 
and anxieties, without having been consulted, having 
no choice in its make- up, in its environment. It 
inherits ignorance and infirmity. It inherits appetites 
and passions, which, at great cost of self denial, 
must be restrained. It is born to a legacy of unavoid- 
able sorrow and suffering. It is doomed to many a 
disappointment, and blighted hope. It must live in 
the face of inevitable death, which often comes ere the 
sweets of life have been little more than tasted. Per- 
adventure the soul wakes to the consciousness of 
great moral responsibility, and realizes that it is a 
solemn thing to fall into the hands of the living God. 
Are the gods capable of compassion and mercy? Do 
they feel the touches of sympathy for the suffering? 

Thus born and thus conditioned, has man any claim 
upon the divine sympathy? May the chastened spirit, 
driven by relentless fate, and sighing for appreciation 
and reciprocity, look up in hope? Does Osiris, or 



172 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Brahma, or the good Ormuzed, Buddha, or Zeus, give 
any intimation that he has a heart of sympathy — that 
he will reach down hands of love and welcome the 
alien home? 

What mean all the self-denial and penance, self- 
sacrifice and self-immolation of human beings that 
fill the pages of history? Are men demented — crazed? 
What mighty impulse has swept over them that they 
should go upon exhausting pilgrimages — should flee 
from the haunts of men to starve in the wilderness, 
should build altars and burn their fellow men, and be 
burnt by them by thousands? Do you say it is ignorance, 
fanaticism, folly? Grant it, but it is not the less real 
and horrid — not the less the outcome of the nature to 
which men were born. They were born to the igno- 
rance, the infirmity, the environment, to the influences 
which more than their own choice have ^^made them 
what they are. ' ' At any rate, in all this degradation do 
they not need commiseration? do they not need sym- 
pathy, if sympathy there be in the hearts of the gods? 
What a pathetic sigh of despair echoes from the 
words of the popular and well-to-do comedian: ^^I 
have worshiped to gods who do not care for me!"^ 

But you may be ready to say, man is not a .mere 
creature of fate. He is high-born, made a little 
lower than the angels, nobly endowed, capable of high 
enjoyment and endless progression. His thoughts 
take wide range and play with the outcropping won- 

I. Menajider 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I73 

ders of the universe. He has seen the beautiful, and 
felt the touches of its joy. He has discovered the 
truth and tasted its sweetness. He has entered upon 
a sphere of activity which is full of inspiration and 
hope! Aye, grant it all; and, what then? He is cut 
down as the flower and withers as the grass, his 
majestic form becomes food for worms, his earthly 
schemes come to naught, his purposes are thwarted, 
his work left imperfectly accomplished, he is cut off 
and taken away forever. All this at least to seeming 
— does he need sympathy — does he need to know 
that 

"Earth hath no sorrows 

That heaven cannot heal?" 

Does he need to know that, somewhere in the 
beyond, the mighty catastrophe he must suffer will 
find recognition and compensation? He may be 
great as men count greatness, but he is yet the vic- 
tim of losses and crosses, of broken purposes and 
blighted hopes — he cannot escape the intermediate 
evil. He cannot escape the clouds and storms that 
come and go unbidden. He cannot pursue his cher- 
ished purposes to their fulfillment, ere death drops 
her dark curtain and the drama closes. And then 
what trusts are displaced, what solemn changes have 
come? Could he be human and not feel in this 
crucial hour the need of sympathy that is more than 
human? What, if such ^^good and ill" is thought to be 
indeed ^^God' s plaf — that the eternal has no heart 
in such a life of vicissitude, and such experience of 



174 THE NEW RELIGION. 

misfortune and suffering, would not raven despair 
crown every death scene, and render life miserable by 
dread anticipation? How does the poor, death- 
smitten soul need to feel that the great God is merci- 
ful and good, and that whatever else may prove to be 
true, He can be trusted in the direst extremities, as 
one that is capable of sympathizing and helpful love. 

But the gods of the Cld Religion are not gods of 
sympathy and love. The Eternal is a God of justice, 
of pure and exalted spirit, far removed from the con- 
cerns of mankind; a God of inexorable law; or, as 
among the Greeks and Romans, of superhuman 
power, capable of every conceivable form of lust and 
passion. The Egyptian might indeed hope to become 
divine, and to dwell among the gods in the ^Tslands 
of the Blessed," but he must first pass the ordeal of 
his forty-two judges, and be weighed in the scales of 
truth and justice. He has no sympathy at court, and 
may not hope for mercy. 

The Brahmin, after infinite penance and prepara- 
tion, may hope for absorption into the Great and 
Holy Being from whom, in the cycles of past eternity, 
the whole universe, including himself, had proceeded, 
but, not until prayer and sacrifice and punishment, 
through sufficiently repeated and protracted transmi- 
grations, had sublimated him into pure spirit. 

The Buddhist talks of heaven and may hope for 
Nirwana; but not until his whole moral organism has 
been practically destroyed by the annihilation and 
obliteration of all sensibility. He must abide in 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 75 

affliction until the spiritual surgery of suffering has 
cut away all emotion, all passion, all desire from his 
nature, and he is qualified to lie down in eternal 
unconscious rest — his last hope — Nirwana. The 
regime is one of inexorable law, without a hint of 
divine clemency or a hope of pardoning sympathetic 
love.^ 

When Confucius was asked whether there is one 
word which includes all the duties of life, he answered, 
yes, and that word is ^^reciprocity;" so thoroughly was 
he penetrated with the need and power of sympathy 
among men. Sympathy is the outcrop and concrete 
expression of love. No one is complete without it, 
either in his suojective condition or in his objective 
relations. It constitutes mankind integrally one, and 
as men are thus one with each other in nature, they 
are one with God, the all Father, who, in his prime 
manifestation to his creatures, is declared to be love. 
''As the hart panteth after the water brook, so panteth 
my soul after thee, O God." 

What shall we say, then, of that religious cultus 
which recognizes no correspondence of mutual sym- 
pathy between the creature and the Creator, no tender- 

I. A God (says Ullhorn, Conflict of Christianity and Heathen- 
ism, p. 30) — A God who takes pity on sinners and turns away the 
proud and self-reliant reverses all the old conceptions of God. 
The gods neither give nor receive love and the strict justice 
attributed to them makes forgiveness impossible. Therefore 
Celsus opposes the Christian God who takes the part of the 
wretched and those who weep and suffer. 



176 THE NEW RELIGION, 

ness, no forgiving mercy? We happen to know, thanks 
to the blessed Son of Man, that He with whom are the 
issues of hfe is touched with the ^^feehngof our infirmi- 
ties,'' but the Old Masters knew it not, and they there- 
fore could offer no such consolation to their suffering 
and dying fellow men. 

There is, however, deep within the nature of man 
an instinctive trust in the divine goodness which all 
philosophy, with her proofs of inexorable law and 
justice, cannot eradicate or suppress, and the cry of the 
Hebrew seer is the cry of the smitten soul the world 
over and through the ages: ^^O that I knew where I 
might find him! I would bring my cause before him, 
I would plead with him as a man pleads with his 
friend. ' ' 

The deep felt sense of want, and need of divine 
help, will not lift, even from those who know not God. 
How sweet the touches of generous appreciative 
sympathy, even of friend for friend, in the dark hours. 
However, after all, human arms are short in the direst 
extremities of the soul. 

But let the victim of suffering, awaiting his inevita- 
ble doom, know that the Almighty Creator, who gave 
him being, and who is privy to all his direst needs, is 
the Father in Heaven, and not only able, but willing 
and lovingly anxious to succour and to save, and how 
does the whole aspect of his life and destiny change? 

But this is a ray of light from the ^^New Religion" 
which is now soon to claim our attention. No Old 
Religion offers such solace. The sun of life, checkered 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 77 

with many a grievous sorrow, sets in ni^ht, relieved 
only, at best, by the flickering hope that somehow, 
sometime in the cycle of revolving ages, the light may 
again dawn upon him, or that he may be permitted an 
eternal, unbroken and unconscious sleep. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

The Supernatural. 

The Old Religions dwelt in the clouds — they 
scarcely ever touched foot upon terra firma. They 
have shed down upon men a mighty influence of bless- 
ing and of cursing, and history has been able to report 
some of their good and some of their evil, but has not 
been able to follow them into the heavens, where the 
clouds conceal them. They were born of the spirit 
and breathe the air of the supernatural. 

There is no religion without mystery, without 
legend, without the supernatural, if we mean by 
supernatural that which has hitherto seemed unac- 
countable on natural principles or by natural law. 

The supernatural, at least in this qualified sense, is 
involved in Christianity and bound up with it. 
That it has been a stone of stumbling and rock of 
offence to certain classes, there can be no doubt. 
Those of a philosophic turn of mind believing in the 
uniformity of natural law, and who habitually seek to 
know the how and wherefore of things, are repulsed by 
what implies disorder in nature, and they naturally 
enough refuse to go forward when they know not why 
or whither. Their studies of physical law and natural 
science have had the effect, possibly, to disqualify 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 179 

them, in some measure, for the airy regions, whither 
the spirit alwa3^s and necessarily tends. At any rate 
they appreciate the advice of Paul to "'prove all thiiigs 
a7id hold fast only that which is good,'' With cold 
logic they are want to insist, that even in matters of 
religion men should be able to give "r reason for the 
hope that is within them." 

But, unfortunately, however, a really good reason in 
matters religious does not always appear to be good 
to the philosopher and scientist. 

The things of the spirit can only be spiritually dis- 
cerned — can only be appreciated by those who can 
rise above the realm of sense, and this he who always 
holds in hand his measuring line and square and com- 
pass finds it difficult to do. 

But, really, one must not be content to abide in the 
merely sensuous, if he is to realize on his possibilities 
as a mxan. He must sooner or later outgrow the 
physical, must develop the psychic, must realize his 
relations to an informing spirit, must come to a con- 
sciousness of what mere matter cannot give. 

But in admitting and claiming the intervention and 
necessity of an informing spiritual discernment, do we 
not throw wide open the gateway to all manner of 
spiritual vagaries and absurd beliefs? 

It is frankly admitted that such doctrine is very 
liable to dangerous abuses, and as a matter of fact it 
has been the fruitful source of visionary and hurtful 
superstitions in all the ages. But without some 
spiritual discernment and recognition of spiritual life 



i8g the new religion. 

there could be no religion, and without religion men 
could not live. 

The case, however, is not so desperate as some seem 
to think. We must distinguish broadly between the 
supernatural and the supersensual. The supernatural 
always transcends our reason, and, as it has been the 
custom to present it, '^ contradicts'^ our reason. The 
supersensual does neither. 

Men are born with certain intuitions and appeten- 
cies, which underlie religion, and upon which it may 
be built, as upon the rocks. Those who do not 
properly read these intuitions out of their own experi- 
ence, and abide in them, are in danger of being 
drifted about by every wind of doctrine, and finally 
lost in the nethermost wilderness of superstition. 

The religious philosopher will stand unflinchingly 
by his intuitions, his reason and common sense — 
which is the God given sense — and, doing this, he will 
walk securely on the high grounds of the supersen- 
sual, and attain a conscious exaltation of life and 
blessing never realized on the lower planes of animal 
life. 

The effort to eradicate the supernatural from Chris- 
tianity has been a prolonged and earnest one. That 
there is much that is good and great in the Christian 
system has hardly been questioned by the most skep- 
tical and prejudiced, and it is felt to be a grand pity 
that it should be so embarrassed and discredited by 
any mixture with the miraculous and supernatural. 

The efforts of Strauss and Renan are memorable in 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. l8l 

the history of the conflict waged against the super- 
natural, as it appears in Christianity; — as to the Ger- 
man, they are pathetic. 

It has been the fashion to decry and behttle these 
struggles with the supernatural, but this fashion, like 
most other mere fashions, prevails among shallow 
people, who are guiltless of any great depth, either of 
candor or charity or learning. 

Recognizing these difSculties as real and great, and 
respecting the candor of those who experience them, 
it has not been the least purpose of these pages to 
present the Christian system in such a light, if possi- 
ble, as to lessen somewhat its apparent supernatural- 
ism, and make it more acceptable to men of this 
class. 

But, saying what we may, if we shall yet have 
something of the supernatural left in Christianity, it 
must seem to be little, when compared with the super- 
natural of the Old Religions. 

In their very warp and woof they are supernatural, 
a fact which, by the way, has been slurred over by 
some who are very sensitive of the supernatural in 
Christianity. 

I am aware that the mystical divinities of the 
Old Religions, in their philosophic and true signifi- 
cance, impersonate principles which thus take a per- 
manent form of expression — a kind of personality — 
but, granting this, we have yet to account for much 
that is built into their character by the fertile fancy, 
rendering them extremely abnormal and grotesque. 



1 82 THE NEW RELIGION. 

They have all the rickety conformation and disjointed 
features of dreams, which stamp them as wholly 
supernatural. Let us indulge but for a moment a 
glance at some of their principal divinities. 

In Egypt, Osiris, in general, represents the good, 
as his brother Typhon does the evil, though certainly 
very imperfectly, since Osiris is often anything but 
good, and Typhon far from being purely evil. 

Osiris was the son of Seb and Nut. He reigned 
over Egypt 450 years, traveled over the rest of the 
world, was assassinated, locked and sealed up in a 
mummy chest and thrown into the Nile. He was 
carried to Bybloss by the waves, lodged in the 
branches of a tamarisk, which, growing, enclosed him 
in its trunk. Isis, his wife and sister recovered the 
chest and took it back to Egypt, was discovered by 
Typhon, who tore the body of Osiris into fourteen 
pieces, which he scattered about the country. Isis 
again sought and found these pieces, except portions 
which the dogs and fish had destroyed. He finally 
emerges as Chief of the Egyptian Pantheon and Pre- 
siding Judge of the Dead! Supernatural enough, you 
say. 

In the Hindu Pantheon we have Brahm repre- 
sented by Brahma, Vishnu and Siva, three separate 
avatars, constituting the Divine Trimurti (Trinity). 

The most remarkable of these is Vishnu. Nine 
times he has been born into flesh, and the devout 
Hindu is now expecting his tenth incarnation. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 183 

He is regarded as the Encompasser, the All Pene- 
trator, as the Supreme Deity forming Heaven and 
Earth; he is the indefinable Omnipotent, the comrade 
of the gods of fire, and the spacious Firmanent. He 
reclines on the Lotus, is fierce as the long-tusked 
boar, is guarded by the hooded serpent of many heads; 
is the primal fish of the ocean of births; is the eternal 
tortoise, and on his back can bear the weight of the 
Universe; is the man-lion and the fulfiller of space, 
who can at will take upon himself the form of a dwarf. 
Brahma, with his four heads, springs into being from 
his naval. He is the husband of the peerless vSita, 
who is so pure that even the flames of a furnace can- 
not take effect upon her person, and much more to 
the same general effect.^ In like manner the whole 
great mythological Pantheon is wrapped in endless 
legend and an all-embracing supernaturalism. After 
making the most liberal allowance for allegory and 
poetic license, one cannot but feel that the unreason- 
ing credulity, which the Hindu's faith implies, is sim- 
ply marvelous. 

Mohammedanism, as compared with the Old Relig- 
ions, is widely different and singularly free from 
the supernatural. It is indeed less interwoven with 
the miraculous than, Christianity. There is but one 
God, and Mahomet is his Apostle, says Mohamme- 
danism. There is but one God, and Jesus, the Christ, 
is his Son, says Christianity. 

I, See Johnson's Cyclop. 



184 THE NEW RELIGION. 

If one claimed to receive frequent revelations from 
the one God, the other claimed to reveal and imper- 
sonate the Almighty Father in what he did and said. 

That the great name of Mohammed should inspire 
veneration, and even worship, can hardly surprise the 
student of human nature, so powerful is the religious 
imagination to exalt the teacher who assumes to know 
the will of God. 

Even the matter-of-fact, non-religious, but great 
Confucius, has not escaped the apotheosizing ten- 
dency, while the mystic and spiritual Gotama was 
almost a born ^^Buddha,'* and, ere the first generation 
of Christians had passed away, it was said of Jesus 
in language sufficiently suggestive of philosophical 
speculation, — ^^In the beginning was the Word, and 
the Word was with God," and, going beyond this, — 
^^the Word was God. All things were made by him, 
and without him was not anything made that hath 
been made."^ 

There can be no doubt that to this tendency of 
human nature, this ready credulity in matters religious, 
may be traced much that has come down to us as 
supernatural in Christianity. 

And hence the necessity of abiding most faithfully 
by reason and authoritative history, in making up our 
conclusions as to the supernatural in our religion. 

In our present state of knowledge if we accept 
Christianity at all, we must accept what is called the 

I. John i: I, 2. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 185 

superncttural. To reject it is historically impossible. 
To do so we must discredit its most sacred vouchers 
and invalidate its claims to truth and consistency. By 
definition, by reasonable construction and inference, 
by historical criticism and emendation, we can reduce 
the miraculous to a minimum, but that minimum will 
remain until it is removed by larger knowledge than 
men now possess, if removed it ever shall be. 

I do not accept the current teaching that, if Chris- 
tianity did not include the miraculous (as the term is 
used) it would not be a religion at all. I cannot think 
that man, endowed with his great powers and his 
thirst for knowledge, must always grope in the dark 
and forever fail to vindicate his right to know what 
the divine order is, and his relations to it. Sometime, 
somewhere, he must be relieved from this conscious 
inadequacy of reason. 

Mr. Hume's famous argument against miracles has 
attracted wide attention, as one absolutely unanswera- 
ble. It is thus stated.- 

^ invariable experience is in favor of the uniformity 
of nature, while it is not in favor of the infallibility of 
human testimony; hence there is, in all cases, a 
greater probability of the falseness of the miracle than 
of the violation of the law of nature thereby implied. '* 

Under the usually accepted definition of the term 
miracle, I am free to admit, I cannot see how the 
force of this argument can be resisted. 

Webster defines the term miracle as ^'an event or 
an effect contrary to the established constitution and 



1 86 THE NEW RELIGION. 

course of things, or a deviation from the known laws 
of nature." President Seelye says: ^^A miracle 
shows a new force introduced into nature, by which 
nature is checked and changed — a miracle may be 
defined, therefore," he says, ^^as a counteraction of 
natu7'e by the Author of natter e.''^ 

To offset this argument of Mr. Hume, it has been 
found necessary to assert, as Mr. Seelye does:^ 

*^ist. The reasonable may have no existence. 

*^2d. There is no universal standard of reason. 

*^3d. There is no uniformity of nature which does 
not imply the supernatural!" 

But, unfortunately for this argument, men go 
steadily forward, assuming that the reasonable does 
exist'y that there is a standard of reason to which all 
men appeal, and that there is a uniformity in the order 
of nature, which does not imply ^^a counteraction of 
nature by the Author of nature." 

The reply shows the desperate strain of the effort 
made to escape from the argument. 

I suggest that the error lies in the definition of the 
term, and the difficulty in our ignorance. 

According to his biographers, Jesus was begotten 
of the Holy Ghost and born of a virgin; and the very 
inception of the whole mov-^ment is, therefore, you 
say, miraculcus. Such an origin is '^contrary to the 
established constitution of things." It shows ^*a new 

1. Johnston's Cyclop., Art. Miracle. 

2. In loco cit. 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 87 

force introduced into nature, by which nature is 
checked and changed." 

But does it? Does it show any counteraction of 
nature by the Author of nature? What established 
order of things is checked and changed? 

Is it an estabhshed order of nature that the domain 
of animated existence shall not be extended? — that no 
more species or genera shall be produced? Very many 
have been produced. We know them, have classified 
and tabulated them. Is it contrary to any established 
constitution of things, or to any law of nature, that 
another genus or another species shall be added? 
That such an event duly notified to us would be some- 
thing new, something different — miraculous, is plain 
enough, but would it be contrary to any existing order 
of nature? Would it oppose or antagonize, or break 
any law of nature? 

It has been maintained by many ripe scholars, 
among whom was our own Agassiz, that there were 
different centers of creation — different genera of men, 
created at different times and places.^ 

I. The unity of man was generally conceded by the early 
naturalists — notably by Buffon, Blumenbach, Linnaeus and 
Prichard. Visey, whose work was first published in 1801, seems 
to have been the first among modern naturalists to call in ques- 
tion the specific unity of man. 

Visey divided man into two species, founding his distinction 
mainly upon the facial angle of Camper. 

In 1825 Borey de St. Vincent divided man into fifteen species. 

In 1826 Desmoulins, who had previously recognized eleven 
species, increased the number to sixteen. 

Jacquinot, in 1849, recognized three species; Dr. Morton, 



1 88 THE NEW RELIGION. 

But while we have not accepted this view, and hold 
that ^^of one blood were created all the nations of the 
earth/' would the addition of another genus be incom- 
patible -mth the ^^established constitution of things?'* 
Would the successive production of new types of 
being be in ^ ^violation" of any known law? Would it 
be a ^^counteraction of nature by the Author of 
nature?" 

But you say whether there be but one genus homo, 
as most naturalists now agree in believing, or two, or 
eight, or sixteen, or sixty-three genera, as others have 
taught, they were not ^ ^begotten of the Holy Ghost 
and born of a virgin." Ah! well — ^^not begotten of 
the Holy Spirit?" How then begotten, pray? Not 
^^born of a virgin?" True, so far as we know. The 
mother conditions of the human race in its origin have 
not been clearly given. Every human being is a 
child of the All Father in Heaven — child of whatever 
mother — Son of God. Jesus was the Son of Mary — 
^^Son of God," sui generis^ ^^the only begotten, full of 
grace and truth." This, at least. Is the story given us 
of Jesus. Will those who insist upon the celebrated 
argument of the great English skeptic, point out what 
known law is here violated even by implication? 

His argument is defective because it assumes that 
a miracle implies a violation of some natural law — a 
fact which is not and cannot be admitted. 

twenty-two families; Luke Burke, sixty-three species; Agassiz 
eight, and in this he was followed by Nott and Gliddon. — John- 
son s Cyclop., Art. Man, by M. B. Apder§on, 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 89 

We leave President Seelye with his inadmissible 
definition of miracle to take care of himself; but, con- 
cluding on this point, we insist against Mr. Hume 
that, so far as this miracle of genesis is concerned, 
there has been no disturbance of the established con- 
stitution of things, no deviation from any known law 
of nature, expressed or implied; no counteraction of 
nature by the Author of nature. 

For a specific and expressed purpose, an addition 
of another order of being was made, and the incep- 
tion of the wonderful movement which has since fol- 
lowed in the world's history is provided for. ^^God so 
loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son 
that whosoever believeth in him might not perish but 
have everlasting life. " 

With such a paternity what should we expect in the 
character of Jesus? The human predominating more 
at first, the divine more toward the last, he grows 
from ordinary infancy and childhood to extraordinary, 
superhuman manhood. Instead of being both *Very 
man" and ^Very God," as the great Council of 
Chalcedon declared, he is neither the one nor the 
other, as his biographers represent him, but, and in 
strict accord with what we know of the laws of repro- 
duction and heredity, he is both the Son of Man and 
the Son of God. He is styled the '^Son of Man" 
some thirty times, and the ^'Son of God" a less num- 
ber of times in these written histories of him. 

If such be the genesis of this remarkable character, 
his sphere of activity would be larger, and his power 



igo THE NEW RELIGION. 

greater than that of a mere man; and it should not 
surprise us if he should be found doing something 
that seems very wonderful, but it is here neither 
claimed nor admitted that he ever transcended his 
proper functions — ever disturbed or counteracted the 
established constitution of things. 

As to what he did do, we have reason to believe, 
comparatively little has been transmitted to us. But 
he is represented as performing some thirty-seven 
miracles, which let us note: 

He stood, with his disciples, by the fig tree, which 
had died at his bidding. They were amazed at his 
power. He said to them, have faith in God. — Mark 
ii: 22. 

He was asleep on board a ship amid a dangerous 
sea. His disciples were alarmed. They aw^oke him 
and, trembling with fear, prayed, ^^Lord save us!" 
The sea at once became calm, and he said to them, 
^^O ye of little faith."— Matt. 8: 25. 

On another occasion the disciples were at sea and 
they beheld Jesus in the distance walking upon the 
sea. The impetuous Peter could not wait, but desired 
to go to meet him, and he bid him come. He 
started, but terrified at the surging waves, he began 
to sink, and cried, ^^Lord, save, or I perish." Jesus 
reaching, caught him, and said, ^^Wherefore did you 
doubt?"— Matt. 14: 29. 

On one occasion his disciples tried to cure a young 
lunatic, but could not. The boy's father took him to 
Jesus and reported their failure. He immediately 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. igi 

effected a cure, and turning to his disciples said, ^'O 
faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be 
with you? How long shall I suffer you?" And, when 
they desired to know why they could not effect a cure, 
he said, ^ ^because of your unbelief." 

Three times he is reported as having brought the 
dead to life, one after being dead ^^four days!" 
Among the other wonders wrought by him were, as 
reported, restoring sight to the blind, hearing to the 
deaf, and health to the sick and diseased. Many of 
them, somehow, were conditioned on "faith.' ^ Of 
these thirty-seven different miracles, so-called, six 
are reported by two, and twelve by three of his 
biographers. 

It must be remembered, now, that these authors 
wrote in an age of miracles — they were common — 
they were in the air. They wrote long after the 
events reported had transpired, twenty to sixty years 
or more afterward;^ and it should not greatly surprise 
us if their accounts should differ in some of the 
details — if some should report what others omit, if 
something of error should be mixed with the truth, 
nor if some things were reported as miracles that were 
wrongfully accredited as such. They wrote what 
they knew, or at least believed to be true, and this is 
all that should be claimed for them. 

But what about being ^'inspired" by the Holy 
Spirit of God, to write only the truth — Well, what 

I. See Haweis' Christ and Christianity, Story of the Four, 
PP- ^5. 43. 73- 



192 THE NEW RELIGION. 

about it? If there are those who can yet accept the 
theory of plenary inspiration, let it be so. They will 
probably in time be compelled to abandon this view. 
Each writer seems to have a personality of his own. 
His language and style are his own. His account 
differs in some respects from that of each of the 
others. Ere the account ends they all confess them- 
selves to have been mistaken as to what, on certain 
occasions, the Master tried to teach them, and none 
of them lays any claim to having been infallibly 
directed to write what he did; even their quotations 
from the Old Testament are frequently forced, some- 
times erroneous — all of which, and more, is incon- 
sistent with the theory of plenary inspiration. 

If,, then, anything has been reported as a miracle 
which is known to contradict or violate a law of 
nature, known to be contrary to the * ^established con- 
stitution of things," it must be instantly rejected, 
there must be error in the report — error somewhere. It 
cannot be historically true, and the Christian religion 
must not be held responsible for it. 

But let us weigh these words. Many, very many 
things are, and must be, believed that are not known. 
I have used the word known. Does any one, or 
more, of the wonderful things done by the Son of 
Man, and reported as miracles, antagonize, contra- 
dict, violate any natural law or '^established constitu- 
tion of things?'' Does the established order of nature 
forbid healing the sick, giving sight to the blind or 
hearing to the deaf? What, then, is the vocation of 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. 1 93 

the physician but a contest with nature? So far from 
it that nature is ever seeking to do these very things 
herself, and, in a great majority of cases, succeeds; 
the broken bone knits, the wound is healed, and 
health restored. But there are cases in which nature 
seems to need a little help, and hence the need of the 
physician. If the physician knew more he could help 
more; at least there is no antagonism between him 
and nature, unless, indeed, he assume the role of the 
^^quack, " and begin outright to antagonize nature, as 
he too often does. 

If, then, the thirty-seven miracles, reported, are hard 
to understand — transcend our knowledge, let us go slow, 
hold them sub Judice, until we come to know whether 
they do actually contradict, or ^ ^antagonize" the 
established order of nature. 

Suppose that too years ago some Watt had left his 
friends in Liverpool, and after less than twelve days he 
had returned to them again, bringing with him a score 
of proofs that he had in the meantime been in New 
York — had made the round trip across the Atlantic ! 
In the face of all proof everybody would have said, 
* ^impossible!" Or suppose some LeSage, loo years 
ago, had said to a friend, step into the office across the 
street, and wait, in six seconds I will send you a mes- 
sage around the world — and it is done. But everybody 
says, ^^Youjoke; it cannot be — it is impossible — pre- 
posterous ! !" 

Or, suppose that but forty years ago some Bell, or 
Gray had said to a friend in New York City, ^^You 



194 THE NEW RELIGION. 

know me well, my voice and manner of speech, with 
its peculiar inflections and intonations; you go over to 
Chicago, looo miles away, put your ear to a little 
trumpet hanging on the wall of the Mayor's office and 
I will speak to you in audible tones, exactly at 4 o'clock, 
p.m., making allowance for difference in longitude. 
At that moment you shall hear me— you will recognize 
my voice, its peculiar inflections and cadences." Pre- 
posterous ! But it is done, and he has heard as per 
agreement ! ! ! 

Or suppose that some Edison, less than forty years 
ago, had said, ^^At midnight to-morrow I will bid the 
light of day flash in an instant from the all-embracing 
air, and light up every city on the continent." 

Or suppose he should say he had in his possession 
a box which he had brought from the opposite side of 
the globe, in which he had locked up a curious speech 
and laid it away for future hearing, and that if his 
friends were curious to hear an Oriental in his own 
voice and words, the inflections and intonations per- 
fect, he would gratify them. What ! Is this Edison 
crazy? The puzzling challenge is accepted. He un- 
locks the wizard phonograph, and sure enough they 
instantly hear the said Oriental begin his speech. On 
and on he goes. The reproduction is exact. Astound- 
ing! What now? Would not all the doctors vote 
Edison in league with the devil, or be disposed to fall 
down and worship him? These sons of genius are not 
wizards, not imposters, not endowed with super, 
natural power. They do not even claim to be begotten 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I95 

of the Holy Ghost and born of a virgin. They might 
each say in all truth and candor, *^the things which 
ye see me do, shall ye do, and even greater things than 
these.'' 

The difficulty with the supernatural in Christianity 
lies most in our lack vf knowledge and not probably in 
any conflict with the order of nature. We know full 
well that mystery and miracle dissolve and disappear 
as knowledge increases. The position attained by 
the profound scholar enables him to see through and 
comprehend a thousand things that are as inscrutable 
as mystery itself, to the ignorant plodders in life's 
pathway below. 

Now, strip the reported m.iracles of Jesus of Ori- 
ental tropes, and Oriental extravagance, and study 
them with Anglo-American directness and common 
sen^e, and how many of them do we know to be incon- 
sistent with the natural order? Different from the 
usual order, new, strange, unaccountable they may 
be, but this does not mean that they must be incom- 
patible with natural law, did we but know the law. 
If you would reproduce an oratorio of Handel, an 
opera of M.ozart, or a symphony of Beethoven, you 
must know what key to touch, what note to prolong. 
Grant that the wonderful Son of Man knew what key 
to touch and what note to prolong, and you probably 
have most, if not all the thirty-seven miracles reported, 
accounted for, and this, too, without hypothecating 
any violation of nature's order. 

It must be noted that Jesus did not claim that this 



ig6 THE NEW RELIGION. 

miracle power belonged to himself only. So far from 
it that he assured his disciples that they too could do 
the same things he did, and even ^ ^greater than these/* 
if they would but put themselves into proper relations 
to the work — they must have ^^faith" — must not doubt 
their ability to do, and herein, let us admit candidly, 
our trouble is doubled. 

This power belongs to men, not because of any 
peculiar sanctity, or holiness of character, giving them 
closer access to God, and securing the divine help. It 
can hardly be said that the disciples had then been 
even converted. They certainly knew little of the 
Christ-mission and the Christ-work. But he assured 
them in true Oriental imagery that, ^^if they had faith, *' 
but as a grain of mustard seed, they could say to 
this mountain, ^^be thou taken up and cast into the sea, 
and it would be done. ' ' 

What now? Are we to be lifted from terra firma 
and suspended in mid ether? Must we at the last 
moment surrender reason, and betake ouraelves to 
faith and mystery, if we would be Christians? 

Or, does the author of Christianity only mean to 
teach us, when his teaching is put into Anglo-Ameri- 
can phrase, that confidence in the result goes far 
toward achieving it; that devotion and concentrated 
effort are conditions of the largest success — that men 
have failed to appreciate these conditions — that 
human power and human effort have not been called 
into action and relied upon for half their capacity? 
Does he mean to teach that, if men, did they but 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. I97 

know it, stand in the immediate presence of mighty 
forces, whose concealed spring they shall yet learn to 
touch, whose latent power they shall yet learn to 
develop, and command for purposes of achieving 
results which only seem to be supernatural? 

We think of spirit. We have a consciousness that 
the soul is something different from inert matter. We 
are accustomed to think of spirit as living and having 
pov/er as opposed to death. But what is life and what 
is death? Science is making more and more narrow 
the chasm which separates spirit and matter — life and 
death. What if this process continues? Give us the 
nearest approach to the brink on the hither and the nither 
side, and may not this required '^faith," this Pistue, 
span the chasm and open up a new world? May it 
not close the circuit of available means and make the 
truly miraculous possible on a scale hitherto unthought 
of ? The human soul touches the external world at 
five points and wakes to conscious relations with it. 
What would a hundred senses instead of only five 
reveal to us? 

Within the deep darkness of a subterranean cavern 
you have perhaps four senses: touch, taste, hearing, 
smell. Introduce a ray of light and another sense is 
given you, and with it behold the over-arching glory! 
Gleaming crystal and stalactite with every hue and 
image of color and beauty. We stand upon the very 
brink of the spiritual. Already the telegraph and tele- 
phone have well nigh annihilated time and space. 
The next turn of the wheel may give us the victory 



198 THE NEW RELIGION. 

over gravity and opacity, contingent only upon the 
use of proper means as indicated by Jesus to his dis- 
ciples. On all subjects and at all times, when proper 
tests have been made, this wonderful Son of Man has 
been found very much in advance of current thought. 
This has been more than once indicated in preceding 
pages of this work. He doubtless had a range of vision 
that ordinary mem have not. Within the larger sphere 
of his knowledge and power, we may suppose it were 
easy for him to do what might seem to us to be very 
wonderful — impossible. In some of these miracles he 
may have been incorrectly reported. The authors 
were human, very human, and very imperfect, and may 
have misapprehended some, or many, of the facts in any 
given case. They may have been imposed upon — 
mistaken — and before taking up a charge against the 
founder of the Christian system, or against any one 
else for that matter, we should know whereof we affirm. 
Jesus was no imposter, no spiritual mountebank, ex- 
ploiting unsupported pretensions before a credulous 
public. His reputation for candor and truth is unim- 
peachable. In the world's history he stands much 
above other men, and I submit that we are hardly com- 
petent to pronounce against him. With reverent 
spirits we may say, with the bewildered Nicodemus, 
'^Hqw can these things be!" But, until we attain to 
greater heights of knowledge and become better able 
to test their truth, shall we be able to intelligently 
reject the miracles of Jesus as false or impossible? 
There is too much for us and for the world in 



THE OLD RELIGIONS. IQQ 

Christianity to allow its claims to be hastily set 
aside. 

I would not ask the skeptic to forego his reason, or 
abandon common sense, as so many seem to do, in 
embracing religion. This were a crime against his 
better nature. There can be nothing sacred enough, 
even in religion, to justify such a course. But if a 
cloud overspread the sun, shall we hastily conclude 
that it has left its place in the heavens? If a spot has 
been discovered upon its disk, shall we close our eyes 
to the radiant light and live our poor lives through in 
perpetual night ? If in the life and teaching of Jesus the 
Christ we find things too high for us — difficult, impos- 
sible for us to understand — let us not allow them to 
discredit our religion, or shake our confidence in what 
we knoiv to be good and true. We can well afford to 
hold them under judgment until the resolving light 
shall come, as come it will, we may be sure. 

But after all, these thirty-seven miracles with which 
his biographers accredit him, are but minor miracles. 
Grant that his parentage and birth were as they have 
been reported, that he lived a blameless and very 
extraordinary life, that he was crucified, dead, and 
buried, and that he rose again to life, displaying evi- 
dently superhuman characteristics, and we need not 
stop to higgle over the question whether he once con- 
verted water into wine at a wedding, or whether in 
some mysterious way, but imperfectly reported, he fed 
4,000 or 5,000 people in the wilderness. Under the 
lead of the principal facts, sufficiently authenticated, 



200 THE NEW RELIGION. 

minors and details must fall into line, and both the 
Christian apologist and the skeptic betray their weak- 
ness when they lose sight of the governing facts, and 
allow themselves to become engrossed with mere 
details and incidents. If the extraordinary life and 
teaching of the Son of Man — his startling revelations 
in the sphere of morals and religion — accord with and 
enforce the circumstantial and historical proof of his 
resurrection and ascension to heaven, we may rest 
assured that somehow all minor mysteries will at last 
dissolve and leave the sky above and about us without 
a cloud. 



We say nothing of schools of theology with their conflicting 
interpretations, nothing of private and speculative beliefs in 
outside circles, nothing of skepticism touching religion in general; 
but so long as religion itself, as a system of truth, is a complex 
inconsistency, or an architectural absurdity, or its disciples are 
ignoraiit of the truths that enter into its composition, there will 
be necessity for repeated exploration, adoption of new definitions 
and ventures on higher achievements. 

— Plato and Paul, 



PART IIL 



THE NEW RELIGION— OUTLINED. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

The Christ Character. 

In pursuance of our purpose to find a remedy for 
the imperfections and infirmities of men, we turn now 
from the Old Religions to the New. Does it supple- 
ment what was found to be lacking in them? Is it 
better suited to the needs of mankind than were they? 
Is it so adapted to human wants as to justify the hope 
that it will become the religion of humanity? These 
are large and serious questions, and they demand our 
utmost candor and most earnest attention. 

Christianity, though a comparatively new religion, 
has now had a history of about nineteen centuries. 
It came, it is said, in the ^ ^fullness of the time" — in the 
golden age of the ancient civilizations, when men 
were better prepared to understand and appreciate it 
than they had ever been. Egyptian theology and 
science had shed their light. The institutes of Menu 
were held in venerated authority. Buddha and Laotze 
^,nd Confucius had taught mankind for centuries, 



204 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Pythagoras and Socrates and Plato had Hved. 
Stoicism and epicureanism had borne their best fruits. 
Greek philosophy was enshrined in tomes of papyrus; 
Greek and Roman science and art in imperishable 
monuments. Rome had thrown her doors wide open 
to all religions, and the light of the ages was concen- 
trated upon the time and the spot when and where 
Christianity had its birth. 

It has since been presented to the consideration of 
more than fifty generations. As a religion it is incom- 
parably simple in its teachings and direct in its pur- 
poses. In a trial of nineteen centuries, under such 
enlightened observation, and before such competent 
judges, one would suppose that its merits or demerits 
would ha.ve been, by this time, so attested as to leave 
no division of opinion and sentiment in regard to the 
one or the other, in the public mind. 

But this result has not been attained. Counting in 
all nominal with real Christians the world over, not 
more than one-fourth of the population of the globe 
has accepted the New Religion.^ 

What then is the matter? Is it because it antago- 
nizes the Old Religions, which men are slow to give 

I. According to Prof. Schem, as quoted by H. W. Bellows, in 
Johnson's Encyclopedia, the population of the globe is 1,392,000,- 
000; Roman Catholics, 201,000,000; Protestants, 106,000,000; 
Eastern Churches, 81,000,000. Total Nominal Christians, 388,- 
000,000; Buddhists, 340,000,000; Mohammedans, 2oi,ooo,ooci 
Brahmins, 175,000,000; Followers of Confucius, 80,000,000; 
Sintoo Religion, 14,000,000; Judaism, 7,000,000; Total of all 
Religions, 1,205,000,000. 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 205 

Up? — because it requires reformation of life, which 

men are slow to make? — because it involves mysteries, 

which men are slow to believe? Possibly, and in 

part. 

Biographers, 

Early in the history of his public life Jesus chose 
twelve men, who became his followers and constant 
companions, and to whom he sedulously sought to im- 
part a correct knowledge of his character and mission. 
Two of these afterward became his biographers. They 
were Jewish peasants, without previous distinction 
among men. 

Mark and Luke also wrote up the story of the life 
and works of Jesus. Mark was the companion of 
Peter, who, as one of the twelve, stood at the head of 
the apostolic college. Mark was himself, no doubt, an 
eye and ear witness to much he records, and accepted 
Peter's account of what was done as authoritative. 

Luke was the constant companion of the great 
apostle to the Gentiles. He was a physician — a man 
of somewhat wider intelligence — but was doubtless 
very much under the influence of Paul, the Jew, whose 
beliefs and opinions may be read between the lines, 
though he himself was more a Greek. 

From these four historians, with incidental contribu- 
tions direct from Peter, and James, and Judas, other 
members of the college, and from Paul, who claims to 
have been a competent witness, we have learned what 
we know of the immediate life and teaching of the Son 
of Man — the founder of the New Religion, 



2o6 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Since the story they have written up is a most won- 
derful one and beyond comparison the most powerful 
in its yet living and wide reaching influence, touching 
all our most sacred interests, it is important to note 
their qualifications for a task so momentous. Are the 
facts they give credible ? Is the subject matter a legend, 
a painted fiction, or a true history? 

Whatever else may be said of them and their work 
through this short and simple narrative^ they have 
become the venerated teachers o£ a large part of man- 
kind, and without pretense of fostering genius, and 
without the patronage of fortune, their story of Jesus 
is certain to outlive the most brilliant and renowned 
^ ^classics.'' 

The subject matter of this history, prhna facie, chal- 
lenges our incredulity and puts upon us the necessity 
of questioning its authenticity at ev^ry step of our 
inquiry into its contents. Abiding, then, by the canons 
of historic criticism, are we compelled to accept these 
narratives as true history? 

1. In the first place these biographers were well 
meaning, honest gazeteers, and wrote down only what 
they knew, or believed to be true. 

This is frankly admitted by all, I believe, even by 
those who have shown the most hostility to their record. 

2. They made no pretense to scholarship or exten- 
sive learning. Not one of them stood at the head of 
any school of philosophy, or was prominent in any such 
school. If John exhibits some traces of Neo-Platonic 
influence^ he nevertheless writes down a simple narra 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 207 

tive of what he saw and heard, indulging but rarely in 
speculation. ^ 

If we except Luke and Paul, they were unsophisti- 
cated peasants, untrained is histronic art, and qualified 
only with good eyes and ears to see and hear, and with 
a good memory to preserve the facts, and an honest 
purpose to make true record of them. 

Luke and Paul, with somewhat wider range of knowl- 
edge, do not vary, but reaiSrm and sustain the story 
throughout as given by their more illiterate fellow 
biographers. 

3. They all had good opportunities to know whereof 
they wrote — Matthew and John especially. Their 
intimate and protracted acquaintance and discipleship 
with Jesus, their presence in moments of great stress 
and emergency, furnished them rare opportunities to 
know him — his habits and manner of life, his temper 
and spirit as they appeared in the flash of his eye and 
tones of his voice — and qualified them for painting the 
artless picture they have given us. 

4. But they could not have been free from errone- 
ous beliefs and prepossession. No historian ever is. 
Profound scholarship, extensive travel and commerce 
with the world, a wide knowledge of the customs, hab- 
its and beliefs of men, will help the historian to rise 

I. It is believed by some that John oiJy furnished the matter 
in substance, and that the gloss of speculation apparent in the ' 
work are chargeable to the compiler, who must have been an 
educated Greek. (See Hawies' Christ and Christianity, page 95.) 



2o8 THE NEW RELIGION. 

above the level of prevailing error and prejudice, and 
divest him of the narrower views of his countrymen; 
but these authors had neither large scholarship nor 
large commerce with the world, nor a wide knowledge 
of the customs and beliefs of other peoples. As already 
said, they were Jewish peasants. They breathe a com- 
mon Jewish atmosphere. They have a common men- 
tal furnishing made up of opinions and beliefs then 
current in the public mind, which were to some extent 
unavoidably woven into their story. 

5. And then, too, they were, and the fact must not 
be forgotten, very much below and inferior to their 
Master, whose life they seek to reproduce. This is 
always and everywhere apparent. They found it diffi- 
cult to understand him. Often they could not under- 
stand him at all, as they frankly afterward confess. 
Often they misinterpreted him as they afterward dis- 
cover and confess. He led the way; they simply 
followed, often utterly surprised and confounded be- 
cause of what they saw and heard. He spake with 
self-assertion and authority. With hesitating surprise 
and humility they listened and treasured up in memory. 
Twenty to forty years afterward they wrote down what 
they could. 

But they wrote wiser than they knew. The deep 
truths, the moral and spiritual significaiice and pro- 
found wisdom of what they somewhat mechanically 
wrote down has furnished themes for study by thq 
^wisest and best through the ages, and yet chaUeuge^ 
I'eji^.W^d ^i}4 qgptiB^^d investigation. 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 209 

6. We are not to suppose their own views and faith 
were free from errors of belief, nor does this conclusion 
rest on any apparent discrepancies in their respective 
accounts. There are some such discrepancies, but 
they are not material. They affect the general account 
little more than to prove that there was no servile 
copying, no collusion to palm off a fiction upon the 
public. These errors were errors of Old Testament 
exegesis, errors in the comprehension of figures of 
speech, of tropes and allegories, in resting in the letter 
and not perceiving the true meaning beyond it. Of 
some of these errors the Master frequently sought to 
disabuse them but could not. Knowledge of the truth 
had to await the revelations of time. 

That they finally caught his true meaning, and put 
down just those words which would convey it to the 
generations that were to follow is hardly probable. 

They have left us a remarkable record, a record 
made in all honesty of purpose, and bequeathed it to us 
for our interpretation in the light of larger knowledge 
and better opportunities. 

So much, it seems in candor, it is necessary to 
grant and predicate concerning these biographers of 
the Son of Man — Son of God. 

While, then, we accept the history of the founder of 
Christianity, as given us by these authors, let us avoid 
the too prevalent practice of ascribing to him teach- 
ings and doctrines which they have not reported as 
his, and which in fact h^ye b^en improperly ascribe^] 
to him b^ ptbejr§, 



2IO THE NEW RELIGION. 

In order to a correct comprehension of the Chris- 
tian system, it has been the custom to consult, not 
only the Evangelists and Apostles, but the Church 
and Church Fathers as well. The ''Church,'" so 
called, assuming to be the embodiment of the Chris- 
tian Religion, has claimed to be its authoritative 
expounder; but it has made sad work of it. 

The Church proper took form after the departure of 
Jesus Christ from among men. It grew up under the 
supervision of the ^ ^Twelve" and Paul, and the 
Fathers. Some of these have been canonized as 
authority in matters of religion, and their teaching is 
held sacred. Whatever views and doctrines they, 
and , the expounding church, in council assembled, 
expressed or endorsed, as judges of the Christian 
Canon, has been credited to, or charged upon, Chris- 
tianity. They have thus becom_e factors in the popu- 
lar estimate of the Christian system. Christianity is 
no longer the embodiment of the principles and 
teachings of its Founder, as illustrated by his life, but, 
the principles and teachings of the ^ ^Apostles and 
Prophets, Jesus Christ being but the Chief Corner- 
Stone." Still later, and now, it is that embodiment 
of doctrines and principles which are represented and 
set forth by the organized church. 

If we would make a proper estmiate of the New 
Religion, as distinguished from the Old Religions, we 
must differentiate it, not only from the mass of specu- 
lation and dogma which preceded it, but also from 
that which has been foisted upon it, and interwoven 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 211 

with, by subsequent teachers and councils. It is 
obviously just and proper to judge the Founder of 
Christianity, and Christianity itself^ by what he taught 
and sanctioned rather than by what others have taught 
concerning him and his teaching. As to matters of 
historic fact, we must accept the statements of his 
biographers; but, as to the drift and significance of 
what he taught, none are to be trusted as supreme 
authority, not even the Apostles themselves, and 
much less the later Fathers and Church Councils. 

"The first century of the Christian era produced a large number 
of literary works, beyond those contained in the New Testament; 
and such of these works as were of genuine Apostolic origin, or 
were faithful representatives of Christian truth, must be sepa- 
rated and recognized apart from all others. There was no distinct 
dividing line to be drawn. The division did not make or suggest 
itself. The whole body of works might be graded from Matthew 
down to the most gross and contemptible product of superstition, 
but the stages were gradual all the way. Different persons 
differed in their comparative estimates (of the several produc- 
tions) though they agreed in the general range of estimate. 

Down to the middle of the second century the Christians used 
the Old Testament for their apologetics and their polemics. We 
do not find in any writers earlier than Irenaeus, A. D. 202, refer- 
ences to the New Testament writings as authoritative, or inspired 
in any such sense as the Old Testament was believed to be 
inspired. The books were collected and studied and compared, 
and their respective authority determined. The informal verdict 
of the Church accepted certain books, and rejected others, but 
there were a num.ber which were on the line or in doubt, as the 
Epistle of Jude, the second of Peter, the second and third of John, 
the Epistles to the Hebrews, etc."l 

1. W. G. Summer, in Johnson's Cyclopedii, Art. Bible 



^12 THE NEW RELIGION. 

The Council of Nice, A. D. 325, has the honor of 
nearly completing the Christian Canon as we have 
it now, though it was not formally declared complete 
until Pope Innocent, A. D. 405, fixed the Canon by 
decree as it now stands.^ 

But by this time great changes had been wrought 
in the status and methods of the New Religion. 

Jesus had taught that his kingdom is not of this 
world — does not depend upon wealth or political 
power. It had its place in the transformed lives of 
his disciples. 

But under date of A. D. 325 it was different. 

The church, under Constantine, had become great 
and powerful. It dictated policies and made emper- 
ors. It held the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven — 
could forgive and retain the sins of men. Without 
its pale men could not be saved — at least such were 
the preposterous claims made by the ecclesiastics 
who assembled to sit in judgment upon the sacred 
canon. 

The Council of Nice VN^as the first Ecumenical. It 
was probably fairly representative, but it is very pos- 
sible that those comprising it were hardly qualified 
for such a task. Some of them were ambitious of 
place and power, many of them were selfish, some 
of them were tools in the hands of unscrupulous 
leaders, and all of them liable to mistake. It is very 
possible that they failed to properly represent the 

I. In loco cit. 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 21 3 

Founder of Christianity in his teaclmig^ as they cer- 
tainly failed to exhibit his spirit in the bitter contest 
they waged with each other in that council. 

King Asoka, the Indian Constantine, had to remind 
the assembled priests at the great council which he 
had called to settle the Buddhist Canon, that what 
was said by Buddha, that alone was well said'^ but the 
Christian Constantine enjoined no such limitation 
upon the Council of Nice. Did the members of this 
great council incorporate nothing of doubtful inspira- 
tion? Were the doctrines which they approved and 
put upon record just such as the Master himself had 
delivered, or fairly deducible from them? Must we 
accept the compact organization then recognized as 
the '^Church," with its claims of power to forgive and 
to retain sins — to bind and to loose the souls of men, 
and its assumption of authority to punish heresy with 
faggot and flame — as the authorized expounder of 
Christian faith and doctrine? Shall we go to this 
council and a teaching church for the contents of 
Christianity? Or to the Founder of the Christian 
religion himself, as he has been presented by the 
historian? 

The earliest expounders of Christianity did not, like 
the present Pope, claim infallibility. Even Paul and 
Peter could not always agree, nor did Paul and Barna- 
bas. The Apostles respectively had their peculiar views, 
but they all gave admirable proof that they had been 

I. Max Mueller, Science of Religion, p. 138. 



214 THE NEW RELIGION. 

with Jesus and learned of him. The best and most 
influential of the Church Fathers, whose memories 
we revere, were farther removed from the fountain 
head of Christian truth, and, having to depend more 
upon interpretation and construction, were more liable 
than the Apostles to err, as they themselves give 
ample proof. 

At any rate, we cannot conclude that their authority 
was such as to preclude criticism and silence doubt. 
Alas! under the reign of unquestioning credulity, 
following myth and miracle, and theological specula- 
tion, Christianity has been led, no one can tell how 
far, into the wilderness of legend and superstition. 

The church is a human institution — very human in 
many of its features. It has dictated creeds and doc- 
trines and dogma, some of which accord with the 
teaching of the Founder of Christianity and some do 
not; and so true is this, that at least the old Roman 
and Greek churches cannot be regarded as admissible 
expounders of Christianity. 

But did not Luther and the Reformation cut away 
from the church unwarranted accretions and restore 
Christianity to its pristine simplicity and purity? Let 
us see. They discarded and denounced the practice 
of selling indulgences; they rejected the Pope's claim 

1. We cannot cut the gospels loose from their historical basis 
and hope to retain long the ideal beauty and truth of Christianity. 
We must have the root implanted in the earth before we can 
have the fragrance in the air. — Smyth, "Old Faiths in New 
Lights." 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 215 

of authority to forgive and to retain sins. They 
replaced his authority by that of the Bible as the 
revealed Word of God, maxing it the infallible arbiter 
in matters of religion. They restored the Bible to the 
hands of the people, and proclaimed the right of 
private opinion; and all this was much for reason and 
the cause of religious liberty. And then, too, it must 
be conceded the ^^Reformation" set on foot by 
Luther, passed be37ond him, in departing from the 
errors of the Old Church. Christian people, exer- 
cising the right of private judgment in matters of 
religion, split into numerous sects, each claiming for 
itself some particular virtue of doctrine or of church 
government. But yet a great majority of all Protes- 
tants, always agreed, and yet agree, in accepting the 
teaching of the Roman Catholic Church as to all the 
fundamentals of doctrine and dogma as they came 
from her teachers and were adopted by her councils. 
They always agreed and yet agree in accepting the 
doctrine of atonement as formulated by Anselm, A. 
D. 1 100, and substantially the whole creed as made 
up A. D. 451, by the Council of Chalcedon, i,ooo 
years before Luther was bor 

'Tf doctrines have been propagated in the name of 
Christianity which are absurd, irrational and impos- 
sible, it has been because the system of Christian 
truth has been misunderstood, and revelation misin- 
terpreted. That this has been so many times it is 
impossible to doubt. "^ 

I. Bishop Foster, in Studies in Theology, Vol. 2, p. 268. 



:2l6 THE NEW RELICION. 

If we abide by the life and teachings of the Lord 
Jesus Christ, as set forth by his biographers, we shall 
not go far astray, nor fail to comprehend the essence 
and substance of all that constitutes the New Religion; 
and this it is our purpose to do without the least 
desire to discredit other canonical authorities. 



CHAPTER XX. 

The Christ Character. 
The Christ, 

It is confessedly difficult to say anything of Jesus 
the Christ, which has not already been said, and per- 
haps controverted — difficult to avoid controversy where 
controversy of all things is the most worthless. 

Jesus, who has just been baptized, is fairly before the 
public, and the marvel of history has begun. *^And 
there came a voice from heaven saying, ^Thou art my 
beloved Son.' " So says Mark, chapt. i:ii. So, 
substantially, says Luke, chapt. 3-22. So says Mat- 
thew, chapt. 3:17. So also John the Baptist is 
reported as saying, John, chapt. 1:33, 34. Jesus is 
thus repeatedly and distinctly set forth as the Son of 
God. 

Some years afterward, according to his biographers, 
when upon the mount of transfiguration, the same 
announcement was repeated: '^And behold a voice 
out of a cloud, saying, this is viy beloved Son in whom 
I am well pleased." Matt, chapt. 17: 5. This is my 
beloved Son. Mark 9: 7. This is my Son — my 
chosen, hear ye him. Luke 9: 25. 

All his biographers thus start out with a very 
unique and wonderful subject. 



2l8 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Of his life previous to his baptism we known next 
to nothing. 

After this, according to the chronologists, he hved 
but about three years, and was crucified as a male- 
factor. 

Usually he spoke of himself as ^^the Son of Man." 
Occasionally he claimed to be the ^'Son of God," or, 
^^a Son of God." 

Son of Man — Son of God, and so declared by a voice 
from heaven. How can this be? Do we step at once 
from terra firma into wonder-land. Must we at once 
betake ourselves to myth and legend — to '^faith and 
mystery ?" 

Well, let us realize that a most unique and wonder- 
ful character lies in the record of four books before us 
— books written by well accredited honest men. More 
than this, this character stands forth in the record of 
nineteen centuries of the world's history and challenges 
our notice — our criticism. It cannot be ignored. // 
must be accounted for. 

We have the account of his biographers on this 
wise — He was ^ ^begotten of the Holy Ghost and born 
of a virgin!" Luke i: 35. '^The Word was made 
flesh and dwelt among us. " Jno. i: 14. An incar- 
nation! Well, the Brahmin has had nine incarnations 
of Vishnu and expects another. Is this incarnation to 
take rank with those of the Brahmin? No matter 
now. 

The following is Luke's account: ''The angel 
Gabriel was sent from God to a Nazarene virgin 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 219 

named Mary, who was betrothed to a man whose 
name was Joseph; and the angel came in unto her 
and said, Hail thou that art highly favored; the Lord 
is with thee. But she was greatly troubled at the 
saying, and cast in her mind what manner of saluta- 
tion this might be. And the angel said unto her, 
Fear not, Mary, for thou has found favor with God; 
and behold, thou shalt conceive and bring forth a son, 
and shalt call his name Jesus. And Mary said unto 
the angel, how shalt this be, seeing I know not a 
man? And the angel said unto her, the Holy Ghost 
shall come upon thee, and the power of the highest 
shall overshadow thee, wherefore also that which is to 
be born shall be called holy — the Son of God.'^ — Luke 
1 : 26, et seq. 

But you say, in the face of Matthew and Luke, 
preposterous! a wild legend, another avatar of 
Vishnu, the dream of some poet's fancy. It cannot 
be history — brush it aside. 

But grant, if you will for a moment, that it is his- 
tory — that these unsophisticated, truth-loving authors 
have given us facts^, grant that such a genesis and 
birth actually transpired, would the life that followed 
have been different? Remember a most wonderful 
life is upon the pages of history and niust be accounted 
for. Do we know enough of the resources of the all- 
creating power to say that a son, an ^^only Son," sui 
generis, could not be thus started into being and sent 
upon a mission.'^ 

But truly, it all seems very strange — very improba- 



220 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ble — yes. However, if you will, let us take this 
account of these honest, well-meaning men in hand, 
and follow this remarkable child into history. The 
mystery we enter is a deep one, it is conceded, but 
let us be candid and proceed. 

Jesus, recognized as a man, was for years scarcely 
distinguishable from other men. ^^Is he not the car- 
penter's son, and his brethren, are they not with us?" 
Matt. 13: 55. But, from the date of his baptism, his 
life became more and more remarkable. He rapidly 
took on modes of thought and conduct that excited 
attention and partisan opposition. He evidently felt 
that he had a great mission to fulfill, and went 
directly to his work, Poor^ humble, unknown to 
fame, he yet evinced a dignity of conduct and authori- 
tative mien and method of teaching which commanded 
respect and the most serious attention. He soon 
became distinguished by gravity of character and self- 
assertion, and for certain great cures and miracles 
which he wrought, while at the same time he mani- 
fested the greatest humility in consorting with the 
poor and suffering, and evincing the deepest sympa- 
thy with them. His criticism of existing customs, 
and especially those of the wealthy classes, was 
unsparing; his doctrines were novel and trenchantly 
stated. His power as a great moral and religious 
reformer soon began to be felt. His manner was 
always kind and affectionate, even toward the lowest 
and meanest outcasts from society, his temper geutl^ 
^nd s^^et;, tiis lif§ p, b^nedigtigrif 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 221 

He did many wonderful things, mostly for the needy 
and suffering — ^ ^miracles" they were called, and his 
fame spread rapidly abroad. The populace began to 
throng around him, and such was the obvious common 
sense of his teaching that ^^the common people heard 
him gladly. '* 

He had a mission. The angel said to Joseph, ^^He 
shall save his people from their sins." It was to 
inaugurate a new regime, to open up and establish 
among men the Kingdom of God, not another Jewish 
theocracy, but such a kingdom as had been fore- 
shadowed, but never understood, by the old prophets. 
Accordingly he began by announcing the immediate 
coming of '^the Kingdom of Heaven." Matt. 4: 17. 
Scribe and Pharisee, Priests and Sanhedrim — all the 
hoary institutions of the Jewish religion, stood in his 
way, and the bitter contest which followed and which 
culminated in his death on the cross, is begun. 

In the mean time, a college of twelve apostles is 
chosen, who become his constant companions. He 
boldly denounces error and sin, discomfits scribe and 
lawyer and priest, reviews the law of Moses, pointing 
out its errors, and insists that it is the first duty of 
men not to tithe their mint, and anise, and cumin, 
and mechanically -^bey Moses, but to repent of their 
sins and seek thet ,igdom of Heaven. The storm of 
religious opposition soon ragesi around him, Nothing 
daunt^dj and r^ever losing his temper, he proclaims 
the solenjn tr^th, so damaging to the Jews as a 
jl^tion^ ^nd the Jewish institutions, and, at the ^anie 



222 THE NEW RELIGION. 

lime, so new and wonderful as to excite the profound- 
est interest in all who heard him. 

But the marvel of his life and conduct becomes more 
marvelous. 

He heals the sick, casts out devils, restores sight to 
the blind and hearing to the deaf, and even raises the 
dead again to life! At least, so it is reported, and so 
it is believed — reported by four biographers, good 
men and true, reported by the college of twelve apos- 
tles, reported by other contemporaries, including 
Paul, and not denied even by his bitterest enemies. 
Of course his fame spread abroad. Men everywhere 
marveled, saying, among other things, ^'What man- 
ner of man is he?'* 

Teaching — speaking such words of wisdom as never 
man spake, encouraging the poor and outcast, and 
aiding the needy and suffering by helpful ministries, 
and exhibiting a pure and spotless life which ever 
seemed to flow from exhaustless fountains of love, he 
went down to death as a malefactor amid his wonder- 
stricken countrymen. 

But the end is not yet. The mystery deepens in 
the record of these four books. 

The life you behold has never been approached in 
its principal characteristics. His self-assertion and 
exercise of authority on the one hand, and his evident 
humility and sympathy with the poorest and lowest of 
men on the other, have amazed men. His acts and 
his words were, respectively, a series of perpetual sur- 
prises, but always tending to deepen the impression gf 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 223 

his essential goodness. He taught with a well poised 
authority that none could resist, and few could ques- 
tion. The most startling announcements fell in quick 
succession from his lips — announcements that crossed 
all previous lines of thought, and turned professional 
moralists and theologians upon their heads. His 
criticism of the Law of Moses, and his interpretation 
of Holy Writ; his pretensions to authority, as dictating 
a higher law and inaugurating a new moral and relig- 
ious order; his power displayed in miracle, and his 
asserted kin-ship and communion with God, confounded 
the most credulous, and the most friendly, and chal- 
lenged universal skepticism. 

^^I am the way, the truth, and the life. '^ John 14: 
6. ^^I am the vine, ye are the branches." John 15: 
5. i' * * without me ye can do nothing. " ^^I and 
my Father are one." John 10: 30. ^^Who hath seen 
me hath seen the Father." John 14: 9. *^A11 power 
is given to me, both in heaven and in earth." Matt. 
28: 18. What pretensions are these? How border- 
ing upon the insane to be made by a poor peasant 
without the prestige of rank, or position, or learning! 

At one time he so grew upon public favor that they 
wanted to take him and make him king, John 6: 15, 
but he refused! After the great temptation, he never 
felt the touch or pressure of political ambition or 
worldly fame. But by the magic of his easy presence 
he attracted men to closest sympathy and fellowship. 
Social, genial, free from prejudice and caste and cant, 
he went about doing good to all, finding opportunity of 



224 THE NEW RELIGION. 

course most frequent among the suffering and forlorn 
poor. In short, he was at once so hke and so unlike 
other men, as to confuse and confound the most saga- 
cious student of human nature. 

But the mystery deepens. He has come into con- 
flict with religious bigotry and intolerance. He shrinks 
from no responsibility and no danger. Scribe and 
Pharisee are wrought into frenzy. They curl the lip of 
scorn, and mutter threats. It is not strange that he 
should anticipate violence at their hands — that he 
should say to his disciples: ^^The Son of Man shall 
be betrayed into the hands of men, and they shall kill 
hira.'^ Matt. 17: 22. It was but the anticipation of 
that foresight which comprehended the impending 
danger. But, when he added, "And the third day he 
shall rise again.'' ^ What then? Rise again! Rise 
again ! ! What could this mean ? 

But on occasions he reiterates the declaration with 
particularity of detail and circumstance. What hallu- 
cination can it be! Does his insanity grow upon him? 
His biographers afterward admit they did not 
— could not — understand what this ^'rising again'' on 
the third day can mean. 

But sure enough, the Son of Man ere long is betrayed 
into the hands of sinful men. They kill him, and on 
the third day he rises from the dead. At least, all his 
biographers say so. All the Apostles say so. They 
had seen him tried and condemned. They had seen 
him expire on the cross — had seen him buried, and 
yet they all affirm that he did rise again^ and they ^re 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 225 

all honorable and truthful men — except Judas. Very 
many others, including Paul, say he rose again. 

They do not say he rose again on mere report, or 
public rumor. The}^ say, we know it, for we have 
seen him. And he took special pains to prove it to 
us, Luke 24: 39-43, to identify himself as the risen 
Lord. He talked with them, ate with them, traveled 
with them, Mark 16: 12, made appointments to meet 
them, Mark i6: 7, reminded them of what he had 
taught before his crucifixion and supplemented it by 
additional teaching. He banished every doubt, even 
from the mind of the skeptical Thomas, Jno. 20: 27, 
that he had on the third day risen again. He was 
seen by the two Marys, and Joanna and other women, 
Luke 24: 10. He was seen by two disciples going to 
Emmaus, Luke 24: 15, 31. He was seen by the col- 
lege of apostles, Luke 24: 36, to whom he showed 
himself alive after his passion *^by many infallible 
proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of 
the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God." Acts 
i: 3. He was seen by ten apostles in an upper 
room, Jno. 20: 30, and again by the eleven, Mark 
16: 14, and Jno. 20: 26. He was seen by seven 
apostles at the Sea of Tiberias, Jno. 21: 12, and by 
the eleven on a mountain in Gallilee. Matt. 28: 17. 

Paul, who was so profoundly impressed by the 
incredible fact that he never ceased to talk of it, and 
to preach it, says ^^he was seen by more than 500 at 
once, and, last of all, he was seen by me also ae one 
born out of due time," i Cor. 15: 5-8* 



226 THE NEW RELIGION. 

How now, shall we brush the story asl^e? Or, is 
the Son of Man — Son of God — begotten of the Holy 
Ghost and born of a virgin — outgrowing his humanity? 

But the mystery deepens. Before his crucifixion 
Jesus had said to his disciples, *^1 came forth from 
the Father and am come into the world.'' ^^Again I 
leave the world and go to the Father." Jno. i6: 28. 
''Yet a little while I am with you, and then I go unto 
him that sent me." Jno. 7: 33. But he was too 
much above them. They could not comprehend his 
meaning. 

Very soon after his resurrection he said to Mary, 
who was the first to recognize him, ''Go to my breth- 
ren and say to them 'I ascend to my Father and to 
your Father, to my God and to your God.' " Jno. 
20: 17. But how dark was all this! Forty days 
after his resurrection, from the midst of a group of 
his disciples, on Mount Olivet, having said, as they 
afterward remembered, "If I be lifted up, I will draw 
all men after me," (Jno. 12: 32,) he was taken up 
and a cloud received him out of their sight! Mark 
16: 19; Acts i: 19; Luke 24: 51. 

And all this strange story is told continuously of 
him who was said to have been begotten of the Holy 
Ghost, a'nd Avas born of Mary; who was baptized by 
John, and announced from Heaven as the Son of God 
— of him who lived as an humble peasant on terms of 
familiarity and affection with his associates, "ate with 
publicans and sinners," Matt. 9: 10, went about 
doing ^'ood among the poor and needy — all is said of 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 227 

him who stood innocent and silent in the judgment 
hall, acquitted and yet condemned by Pilate, put to 
death by a mob, praying with his last breath for 
his murderers — ^ ^Father, forgive them, for they know 
not what they do," and at last raised from the dead 
and taken to Heaven!! What now? The skeptical 
Thomas exclaimed, in the crucial hour of his doubt, 
^^My Lord and my God!'' 

What conception of his character is possible? Can 
contrarity take on the color of consistency? The pano- 
rama passes and all parallels disappear. In the 
record of these four books he stands forth an unsolved 
mystery — an abiding wonder character, yrt challeng- 
ing alike our faith and our skepticism. 

But can we not brush the incredible story aside as a 
dream of some disordered fancy — as a myth born some- 
where in the realm of fancy? Was not Romulus 
miraculously saved by a wolf? and, afterwards, did not 
a whirlwind and cloud take him up out of sight? Was 
not Sakya Mouni the son of a prince, a hermit in the 
wilderness, a great preacher of new doctrines, born as 
many times ^^as there are leaves in the forest," then 
enthroned as a god and worshipped as Buddha? No. 
We cannot brush aside this story as we do the 
legends about Romulus and Sakya Mouni 

The whole life of Romulus is prehistoric. He 
emerges as a myth in an age of myths. He has little 
place in what pretends to be history. There is 
scarcely a trace of him to be found in the institutions 
or the thought of the world. 



228 THE NEW RELIGION. 

And Sakya Mouni, too, is prehistoric. His reputed 
high birth, his strange and unnatural Hfe as a recluse 
in the wilderness, are stories from the legendary past. 
Tradition has delivered him to us as a great reformer. 
The legend breaks down under the weight of utter 
improbability, and it may well be doubted whether 
the traditional Buddha ever had a personal existence. 
There is no reliable proof of it — not a syllable. 

We brush aside these stories, but the story of Jesus 
we cannot brush aside. 

Jesus came upon the stage in the ^ ^fulness of the 
time,'' (Gal. 4: 4,) in the palmy days of Roman civili- 
zation. History had already enshrined the learning 
and the arts of Greece. The genius of her statesmen, 
her philosophers, her orators and poets, stood full- 
orbed in the zenith of her glory. Augustus was upon 
the throne. It was ^ ^Rome's golden age." History 
and criticism never commanded greater ability nor 
wrought better results. It was no time for imposi- 
tion upon public credulity. The disappointed and 
chagrined Jew was the sworn enemy of the Son of 
Man, and stood ready to expose and suppress 
him. 

We cannot brush this story aside, because we know 
those who presented it to us. We know where they 
lived and how they did. We know Peter and James 
and John as well as we know Solon or Seneca or 
Epictetus. We know Paul and Luke as well as we 
know Cicero and Pliny. And we know them, too, to 
be every way as trustworthy. Nor did what they say 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 229 

of Jesus, let it be remembered, drift down through 
dim centuries of tradition and superstition. 

One of the twelve whom he had chosen betrayed his 
Master and then hanged himself. Within a few days 
after the departure of Jesus, the remaining eleven 
thought best to choose a successor to ^^Judas" ^^from 
among those," said Peter, ^^who have companied 
with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and 
out among us, from the time he was baptized of John, 
until he was taken up from us." (Acts i: 21, 26.) 
Why? What for? ''To be an eye-witness with us of 
his resurrection,'^ 

The facts are spread abroad among the Jews. 
Within a few days we have the Pentecost; and Peter, 
standing up with the eleven (Acts 2: 14, et seq.), 
said to the very men v/ho had planned and executed 
the crucifixion, ^^Ye men of Judea, and all ye that dwell 
at Jerusalem, be this known unto you and hearken to 
my words. * * Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of 
God among you by the miracles and wonders and 
signs which God did by him, in the midst of you, as 
ye yourselves know, being delivered, '^ "^ ye have taken, 
and, by wicked hands, have crucified and slain, whom 
God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death 
— this Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we are all 
witnesses. ' ' 

Was this appeal to matters of fact denied? Was 
this home thrust resisted? Was this the setting of a 
myth? the style and jugglery of an imposter? Why 
did not the crafty officials who had just compassed his 



230 THE NEW RELIGION. 

death, Instead of being * ^pricked in their hearts and 
crying out, men and brethren, what shall we do?" — 
why did they not face Peter and denounce the whole 
story as false? 

Within two years Paul is converted (Acts 26: 13), 
and with full knowledge of the facts, not only endorses 
the story as true, but makes it the basis of his preach- 
ing everywhere throughout the most remarkable and 
successful gospel ministry ever accomplished. 

Within eight years the story of this unique and 
superhuman character, attested by hundreds and 
thousands of ardent disciples, spreads over Judea and 
out into Syria, and a church is organized at Antioch, 
taking the name of Christiaii. Acts 1 1 : 26. Where 
is there time or place for myth and legend? Could a 
myth be born in a day, and be made to play such a 
roll, at such a time, in such a country, under such 
circumstances? 

We cannot — the great Strauss could not — brush 
aside this story. It is too much rooted in the history 
of the time and in all subsequent history. 

Whence the mighty changes that gave birth to our 
Anno Domine calendar? Whence the ideal character 
which, says Mr. Leckey, ^ ^through all the changes of 
eighteen centuries, has inspired the hearts of men 
with an impassioned love, lias shown itself capable of 
acting on all ages, nations and temperaments and 
conditions, has been not only the highest pattern of 
virtue, but the strongest incentive to its practice, and 
has exercised so deep an influence that it may be 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 23I 

truly said that the simple record of three short years 
of active life has done more to regenerate and soften 
men than all the disquisitions of philosophers, and all 
the exhortations of moralists.^ 

What, kind reader, can we say now of this remarka- 
ble child, said by Matthew and Luke to have been 
begotten of the Holy Ghost and born of a virgin? 
Could his career have been what it was on any other 
hypothesis? 

Nineteen centuries have failed to give us any other 
or better account of the ^^Son of Mary" than that 
given by the unsophisticated peasants whom he chose 
to follow him; and, however overwhelmed by anoma- 
lous character-phenomena, we are yet face to face 
with a broad necessity that compels his acceptance as 
a genuinely historical character, which we cannot, if 
we would, displace from the record of events. His 
place in history as a great reformer, as the founder of 
the Christian system, as one that has influenced the 
world as no one ever did or could, mtcst be conceded. 
Grant that Jesus was begotten of the Holy Ghost and 
born of a woman, as these authors agree in assuring 
us, we miust then expect a superhuman career. It 
would border on the grotesque and ludicrous to 
claim such a parentage for an ordinary or purely 
human life. 

But accepting the account given, and the life and 
character of the Son of Man could consistently be what 

I. History of European Morals, Vol. 2, p. 9. 



232 THE NEW RELIGION. 

they are represented to be — what we see them to be, 
standing out in nineteen centuries of past history — 
symmetrical in their origin and in their end? Does 
not such a career as that of Jesus Christ, impHcitly 
assert and require something superhuman in his 
origin? 

But, while some have had difficulty in going so far 
with the Evangelists as to believe that Jesus was 
really the Son of God, there are others who hasten 
away to the other extreme and hold him to be ^^very 
and truly God," * ^co-equal with the Father," in all 
the attributes of Omniscience, Omnipotence and 
Omnipresence. 

There have always been two classes of men. Those 
of one class are more reverent, more inclined to 
believe and to trust. They are ever ready to follow 
leaders and to exalt them. They make heroes and 
canonize saints. 

Those of the other class are more egoistic. They 
have more personal individuality. They are the last 
to exalt leaders or to canonize saints. 

It would be very natural for the former, and they are 
largely in the majority, to ^'magnify the Lord," to 
sink the human and exalt the divine, in the character 
of the Son of God. And it would be as natural for 
the latter to eliminate the supernatural, to sink the 
divine and exalt the human. Accordingly the two 
classes make up very different opinions as to the origin 
and nature of the Founder of Christianity, and very 
different opinions as to doctrines and creeds. 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 233 

The former are fairly represented by the Council of 
Chalcedon, A. D. 451, which has the honor of com- 
pleting the formula of Christian doctrine, as held ever 
since by all orthodox churches, Catholic and 
Protestant. 

The article relating to the nature of the Christ, as 
formulated by this Council, is given as follows by 
Prof. Schedd:^ Jesus Christ is perfect as respects 
Godhood, and perfect as respects manhood. He is 
truly God and truly man, consisting of a rational soul 
and body. He was begotten of the Father before 
creation, as to his Deity; but in these last days he 
was born of Mary, the mother of God, as to his 
humanity. He is one Christ existing in two natures, 
without mixture, without change, without division, 
without separation, the diversity of the two not being 
at all destroyed by their union in the person, but the 
peculiar properties of each nature being possessed, 
and concurring to one person and one substance. 

It must be admitted that a large majority of all pro- 
fessing Christians during all the fifteen following cen- 
turies of the history of Christianit}^, have accepted 
this view, and a large majority still accept and hold it; 
and this is admitting much in its favor. 

Of those who have not been able to accept this 
view of Christ's essential deity, there are various 
opinions as to his nature and comparative divinity, 
ranging from those of Arius to those of Channing and 
other Unitarians. 

I. Johnston's Cyclop., Art, Christology. 



234 '^^^ ^^^ RELIGION. 

Without desiring to extend a discussion which 
promises so Httle in the way of practical utiHty, I can 
see no reason for taking issue with the account given 
by his four biographers as plainly given. 

If indeed he were begotten of the Holy Ghost, and 
born of a virgin, then were he both the Son of Man 
and the Son of God. The Son participates in the 
nature of both parents — this is physiological law as we 
know it. 

If this law is to hold universally — and we believe in 
the uniformity of nature — Jesus was both the Son of 
God and the Son of Man, and we shall find that his 
life and mission fit unto this view better than into 
any other and is consistent throughout. If this view 
thus presented by the Evangelists be the true one, 
then this Son of Man, Son of God, belongs properly 
neither to the genits homo nor to the ge?ius deus. He 
1*^ sui generis — the ''only begotten son^^' and born to a 
larger sphere of activity than the merely human — to a 
specific mission and destiny; and this obviously 
accords with the authoritative declaration, ^^God so 
loved the world that he gave his only begotten son 
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, 
but have everlasting life," (Jno. 3: i6)-^-a purpose 
and mission one may well think too great to be 
entrusted to a mere man. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

Jesus an Exemplar. 

However the life and character of the Son o^ Man 
ma}^ impress us as being somehow above the human, 
especially in their later phases, there can be no doubt 
that for the most part of his earthly career he lived 
as a man among men, and that as such he is best 
known to history. 

Those who feel compelled to regard him as merely 
the highest style of a man, excelling others only in 
his superior moral and spiritual development, say, 
and with reason, that so regarded his life would be 
more really exemplary and inspiring than it could be 
if he should be considered in any degree superhuman, 
and especially so if he is regarded as very God. 

Without wishing to detract from the merits of this 
view, I think it may be said that any one who should 
be able to resist all temptation, as he did, and live a 
life of ideal perfection, be he ever so human, could 
hardly be looked upon by his more imperfect fellows 
otherwise than as possessing some advantages of 
birth or education or environment which had been 
denied to themselves. If to be a true and helpful 
exemplar, one must live on the same plane, and havg 



236 • THE NEW RELIGION. 

the sam^ infirmities, that those who would follow 
have, then it may well be doubted whether our best 
men may be held up as exemplars; for there can be 
no doubt that there are hereditary differences among 
men, and that the inborn tendencies to vice in some 
are much stronger than in others. Success under 
great difficulties and temptations is always inspiring, 
and this the devoted son of Mary most gallantly 
achieved. 

It is much that he placed before us an ideal charac- 
ter, even though he had superior powers, especially as 
we know that in any just estimate of our characters, 
due allowance will and must be made for any disad- 
vantages or weakness we had suffered. 

However this may be, the Lord Jesus certainly 
gave full proof that he was capable of the most human 
feelings and sympathies. What could be more tender 
and touching than his oft-repeated generous ministries 
among the poor and suffering? What more beautiful 
than the interest and affection he manifested toward 
the little ones which fond mothers familiarly pre- 
sented to him, or the ready and unqualified appreci- 
ation of the penitent, even among the lowest and most 
abandoned. In the case of the frail woman taken in 
adultery could the mercy have been larger, or the 
sympathy deeper, or the encouragement to a better 
life stronger, had the verdict, ^ ^neither do I condemn 
thee, go and sin no more," come from the most 
human lips? In all these early years of his life he was 
not in the habit of going where others could not hope 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 237 

to follow. He went in easy intercourse among all 
classes — among publicans and sinners, eating and 
drinking with them, proof of born companionship. 
He sought opportunities, as any others could, to 
render assistance to the needy. He taught men, as 
best he could, to walk in the pathway of duty, him- 
self always living in such a way as that he could sa}^, 
follow me. Was Socrates or Seneca, Marcus Aure- 
lius or Epictetus a more approachable, a more inspir- 
ing exemplar? 

Unlike the Brahmin Yogin, the Buddhist recluse, 
or the Mohammedan Fakir, he lived, apparently at 
least, on the same plane with other men, and on terms 
of the most familiar intercourse. If he attained to 
greater heights of moral and spiritual power and per- 
fection than others, he never failed to leave behind 
him an example of unaffected humility and charming 
companionship, from which the weakest of mortals 
could draw inspiration and hope. It is much that he 
gave us an ideal toward which we may aspire, much 
that he gave it form and setting in purely human con- 
ditions, and, if he appear superhuman at all, he does 
so scarcely less in the elegant finesse and charm of 
his fellow-like experience, and the delicate and inspir- 
ing touches of the humane, always so characteristic of 
his intercourse among men, than in what he did in 
the more inexplicable denouements of his career. 

If, in the later developments of life among men, he 
outgrew his humanity more and more, he yet breathed 
the atmosphere of human life and shed upon his dis- 



238 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ciples and friends the fragrance of the most tender and 
affectionate sympathy. 

But his career as an exemplar is ended. Behold 
the Son of God! Inexplicable, astounding phenomena 
are now witnessed; authoritative, sententious teach- 
ing, strange predictions concerning himself, his trans- 
figuration! his death and resurrection! What shall we 
say but that he is passing beyond the outermost range 
of human infirmity, to the realization of his higher life 
as the Son of God? And then opens that wonderful 
Epiphany of fort}^ days, during which he glided so 
lightly along the borders of the infinite, until he 
ascended ^'to my Father and to your Father, to my 
God and to your God.'' 



CHAPTER XXII. 

Jesus a Teacher. 

As a teacher of men, wise and capable, Jesus is 
winning more and more the confidence of the world. 
If he ever did wrong, or made mistakes, the fact has 
not been authenticated. 

^^Wisdom," said Solomon, ^^is the principal thing," 
but by wisdom he meant, no doubt, a great deal more 
than mere knov/ledge. He meant that capacity of 
wise choice and prudence which keep men from mak- 
ing mistakes and falling into hurtful errors. 

The Son of Man possessed this wisdom. He has a 
place in history, not as a philosopher, or scholar, or 
statesman, but as a great teacher, nevertheless. He 
was not distinguished for possessing, or, at least, 
evincing wide and varied knowledge, but for possess- 
ing the right kind of knowledge, and just the kind of 
knowledge which always served his purpose. There 
is much knowledge that is not worth the getting, and 
some even the worse for having. Some very industri- 
ous seekers after knowledge have made the mistake 
of looking upon it as an end, whereas it is, at best, 
but a means to an end. It is as incumbent upon 
those seeking knowledge to inquire for what good, 
cui bono, as it is for those seeking wealth, or fame, cr 



240 



THE NEW RELIGION. 



power. But the fact is, all these classes of seekers 
too generally fail to make such inquiry. Knowledge 
is useful in proportion as it tends to make one wise, 
and enables him to achieve results. He who makes 
no mistakes will always succeed. He never stumbles 
and falls, is never compelled to retreat and begin anew. 
He is as wise as he needs to be, to be perfect, and 
perfectly happy. He will fill up the measure of life's 
duties and attain happiness, the divinely appointed 
goal of life. 

The Son of Man made no mistakes, and, we may 
believe, completely accomplished his mission. He 
went directly and continuously from Egypt to Canaan 
— there were for him no forty years of weary wander- 
ing in the wilderness. 

We know not, nor need we care just now to know, 
how it came to be that he knew more and better than 
Moses, but he did. Moses had been taught the learn- 
ing of Egypt, which was varied and great, he had 
been on Sinai, and held secret council with the Most 
High. But in'wisdom Jesus stood above him. 

The lips of the Old Prophets had been ^^touched 
with coals from the altar." They were accustomed 
to holding converse with God. They had had strange 
glimpses into the future — moments of seraphic inspira- 
tion and foresight. But, somehow, the Son of Man 
was yet above them. It had been well had their 
teachings and warnings been heeded; and the ^^Law," 
given by Moses had its sanction from Mount Sinai. 
But it remained for the son of Mary to disclose the 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 24I 

true intent and full significance of the ^^Law," and 
the prophetic teaching as well. Matt. 22: 40. 

As given in that early age, this teaching was suited 
to the capacities and needs of a peculiar people — the 
conditions of that dark age. But in the ^^days of the 
Son of Man" it needed modification and supplement. 
The son of Mary had the penetration to see through 
all, to understand all. He had no censure for Moses, 
or for the prophets. But without offensive criticism 
he thrust the keen blade of criticism into the Law of 
Moses and the teaching of the prophets, and laid 
open their defects. ^^Ye have heard it was said," * 
^^butlsay," etc. Criticism, supplement. ^^Whence 
hath this man this wisdom and these mighty works?" 

The standard of duty, high enough for a dark age, 
now needed raising. The thought of the world was 
rising out of types and symbols. It was throwing 
off, more and more, the external and spectacular. 
The practice of rites and ceremonies, the killing of 
bulls and goats, and the burning of incense, are no 
longer sufficient. More enlightened men began to 
feel that above and beyond this display of types and 
S3^mbols there is a more spiritual realm, which all 
these external and mechanical contrivances failed to 
set forth. A new cultus was needed. Moral obliga- 
tions must be more closely and clearly defined, a 
higher standard of duty raised. But who could do it 
but him, who '^spake as never man spake?" 

To impart a better conception and ideal of God, to 
disclose the deeper and true significance of the Mosaic 



242 THE NEW RELIGION. 

and prophetic teaching; to interpret and give true 
meaning to the ^^commandments," to amplify the code 
of prevailing ethics, and to open up the way to another 
and better life, as he did, goes much farther to show 
forth the wisdom of this great teacher than the apt 
and overwhelming replies he made from time to time 
to the astute lawyers and hypocritical bigots who so 
sedulously sought to entangle him in criminal incon- 
sistency. And yet, how peculiarly happy and over- 
mastering were these replies. ^ ^Render unto Caesar 
the things wliich are Caesar's," etc. Indeed, such 
were his easy mastery in all these ^ ^passages at arms" 
that ere long all became afraid of him, and no man 
^ 'dared to ask him any more questions" with a view 
of embarrassing him. He never became befogged 
with doubt or tangled in the meshes of their casuistry. 
He never lost his poise, or yielded his vantage ground. 
Secure himself in the fortress of truth and conscious 
rectitude, it seemed the easiest thing possible for him 
to rout and discomfit his enemies and put all their 
intrigues and subtility to shame and confusion. 

Those who heard him were constantly surprised. 
*'He spake as never man spake" — this was the 
feeling. 

Coming out of the moral darkness that then brooded 
over the nations, he unfolded the deep things of man 
and of God. He walked easily and firmly forward 
where others stumbled and fell. He mounted upon 
heights never before trodden, and to which men have 
found it difficult to follow. The more we study him 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 243 

the more profoundly convincing — the more marvelous 
he becomes. 

Since he taught in Gallilee the world has made 
advancement in various kinds of knowledge. Has he 
been found in error? Were he teaching now, would 
he teach differently? Other wise men, and even philo- 
sophers have been outgrown. They have been found 
to be in error at points. Were they living they would 
modify their teaching — would the son of Mary? So 
far from it that it is becoming more evident as knowl- 
edge increases that he still leads all other teachers, 
even in matters scientific and philosophical, where he 
made no pretensions to leadership. This may seem 
to some extravagant, but most frankly, for one at 
least, I believe it to be true.^ 

Nor must we fail to note that he always had the 
courage of his convictions. Few have ever had such 
courage, and these have gone to the stake with 
scarcely an exception. 

He looked beyond the surface. He held sham and 
pretense in contempt. He taught the truth as it 
stood related to the intent and purposes of the soul. 

I. Above the intermediate levels of common human nature, 
across the intervening distances of history, an image of solitary 
majesty stands out before the mind, and the view of that sublime 
character, rising from the midst of our low, monotonous human 
attainments, clearly outlined against the soul's horison in its won- 
derful elevation, is an inspiration and a joy, awakening the whole 
moral enthusiasm of our being. Dr. Smyth, in "Old Faiths in 
New Lights," p. 227. 



244 THE NEW RELIGION. 

He traversed prevailing customs, and with inflexible 
fidelity exposed their hollowness and their iniquity. 

He laid open the errors and the bigotry of syna- 
gogue and Sanhedrim. He unmasked the Scribe and 
Pharisee. He exposed the miserable travesty of 
ethics and religion, as presented by Rabbi and priest. 
His teaching went to the heart of matters ^ ^sharper 
than any two-edged sword, even to the dividing 
asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and mar- 
row, discerning the thoughts and intents of the heart.'' 
Heb. 4: 12. 

It was so different, so radical, and withal so damag- 
ing to the pride and pretensions of men in authority 
that it had within it from the first, as another has 
said, ^^the shadow of the cross. "^ The narrow- 
minded bigots, who had assumed to teach by authority, 
could not brook the indignity his teaching implied. 
Humbled, chagrined, embittered, they knew not what 
more or better to do with this Gallilean peasant, who 
had so presumptiously assailed their teaching and 
their authority, than to kill him; and kill him they 
did. 

As a teacher he dealt chiefly with ethics and relig- 
ion, subjects that lie very close to all the great inter- 
ests of men. The truth here is too sacred to admit 
of subterfuge or tampering. It must be set forth in 
its simplicity and directness. He addressed himself 
to the dangerous task without protection and without 

I. Jos. Parker. 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 245 

hope of reward. Such a school had never been 
opened, such a teacher the world had never had. 
In the love of the truth he taught, for the love of the 
truth, he was sent to the cross. No one, not even 
Confucius, ever so captivated the hearts of his pupils. 
None ever so comprehended the nature of man, or 
opened up to him a destiny so hopeful. None ever 
sustained a character so perfect. After 1,900 years 
of attentive listening and careful examination, the 
verdict of the world is the verdict of the Old Scribe; 
**Master, thou hast well taught." 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

Jesus a Philanthropist. 

Finally, let us indulge for a moment another view 
of the more human characteristics of the Son of Man. 

His biographers represent him as living a life com- 
pletely dominated by love. It is the very essence and 
spirit of love to help and to make happy the object 
loved — to do him good in every possible way; and 
this Jesus did habitually. There were none so poor 
or degraded whom he did not recognize as possessing 
a nature which allied them to God and made them 
brothers to himself. 

^^Love," said Paul, ^^suffereth long, and is kind; 
love envieth not; love vaunteth not itself, is not 
puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh 
not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, 
rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; 
beareth all things;" all of which he easily read out of 
the character of the exemplary Son of Man. How he 
suffered long and was kind, how he bore himself 
meekly and behaved himself seemly, how he sought 
not his own good but that of others, endured provo- 
cation, rejoiced in the truth; how he endured all 
things, makes up a large part of the story of his won- 
derful life. 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 247 

It may be thought that, in denouncing the Scribes 
and Pharisees as hypocrites, he manifested a spirit of 
anger and hate. Mark tells us, indeed, in so many 
words, that ^'he looked round upon them with anger, 
being grieved for the hardness of their hearts." But 
this view does great injustice to his character. 

In this denunciation, as often elsewhere, his language 
is highly figurative — oriental, and his metaphors must 
be taken in their meaning. 

To characterize certain men as a generation of 
vipers seems indeed harsh to our ears, and when he 
applied this language to the Scribes and Pharisees 
how shall it be understood? Not certainly as imply- 
ing personal enmity. When the Baptist went preach- 
ing in the wilderness he noticed among his hearers 
certain Scribes and Pharisees, and turning upon them 
he addressed them as a '^generation of vipers." He 
used a common trope expressive of his conviction 
that, though teachers and leaders of the thought of the 
age, they were nevertheless egotistic and hypocritical. 
It is not at all probable that he held any personal ill-will 
against them. He knew of their claims to superiority, 
how they gloried in being the children of Abra- 
ham, and how, under all these professions, there lay 
concealed, as a serpent, a thorough and blighting 
selfishness, and hence his metaphor. 

Precisely the same may be said of Jesus. His lan- 
guage sprung not out of personal bitterness and hate, 
but out of the fact, well known to himself, of their 
habitual and persistent hypocrisy in posing before the 



248 THE NEW RELIGION. 

public as being better than they really were at heart. 

^^How shall ye escape the damnation of hell?" 
Terrible words, you say, are these. Can they be in 
accord with the spirit of love with which he is so gen- 
erally accredited? This damnation of hell can mean 
nothing more than condemnation in the light of truth, 
a necessary consequence of their hypocritical conduct 
— a threatened result over which he felt the deepest 
sorrow. That he only denounced their unreasoning 
bigotry and obstinate hypocrisy, is made plain by the 
term hypocrites, which he does not fail to repeat, and 
by what he charges them with doing. That he 
was perfectly free from personal ill-will and bit- 
terness, must be admitted, since, putting these 
same several parties together, he includes them in 
that pathetic lament over their national capital: '^O 
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how oft would I have gathered 
thee together as a hen gathereth her chickens under 
her wing, but ye would not." And then, in a few 
days, when these same Scribes and Pharisees had suc- 
ceeded in nailing him to the cross, we discover his 
true feelings for them as men in his prayer on the 
cross: 

^'Father, forgive them, they know not what they 
do!" 

No one act, or any dozen, exhibits the whole moral 
character of the actor. There is within the sinner a 
whole world of moral capacity and goodness, which 
we are liable to forget, when we see one doing what 
we believe to be wrong, especially if he be an enemy 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 249 

> — a fact which the Son of Man never lost sight of, and 
which underhes the injunction, '^Love your enemies." 
He could 

* * '^- "Hate the sin 
And yet the sinner love." 

His fierce denunciation was leveled against their 
crimes, their hypocrisy and selfishness, which must 
inevitably entail upon them ^^woe! woe!" We must 
let his dying prayer interpret Lis bold, earnest, faith- 
ful words, when, in the very crisis of his mission he 
felt it to be incumbent upon him to stand unflinch- 
ingly for the truth, and to take every responsibility 
which his great work involved. 

If we look among the great philanthropists of his- 
tory we shall find no parallel to the wonderful Son of 
Man. 

In a celebrated passage from Rousseau we have a 
comparison between the Son of Sophroniscus, the 
reputed father of moral philosophy, and the son of 
Mary, the Founder of the New Religion. 

They both stood by their convictions of duty in the 
face of ignominy and death, and were both murdered 
in consequence. Socrates approached nearer in char- 
acter to Jesus than did Plato. He could see more in 
man than did his illustrious pupil. He felt the pulses 
of a common brotherhood which Plato did not. He 
had convictions of duty toward all classes of men — 
certain qualms of ccnscience which never seemed to 
trouble the great Plato. 



250 THE NEW RELIGION. 

He had an inveterate passion for ' 'philosophizing 
and testing things." 

He beheved that men were in error, and his benevo- 
lent interest in them prompted most assiduous efforts 
to aid and help men to better views. It was a strong 
conviction laid upon him by the gods. In his fidelity 
to the truth as he understood it, and in his antipathy 
to falsehood and pretense and shams, he was no mean 
prototype of the great Gallilean, who was to follow 
him. '^I choose to obey God rather than men, and 
so long as I live and breathe I will never cease philo- 
sophizing and exhorting any of you I may chance to 
meet, as I have been wont." These were among his 
last brave words. 

Mr. Blackie ascribes to Socrates a '^fine erotic 
passion for human beings — a divine rage for humanity, ' ' 
which was the inspiration of his hfe, and ''which put 
into his hand the golden key to the hearts of all teach- 
able men."^ If wa grant so much we must not fail to 
note that this "divine rage for humanity," in Socrates, 
differed very much from the "love that so loved the 
world" in his successor. The one Master sought to 
respond to the needs of men as he himself saw them, 
and in doing so not unfrequently mortified and 
offended them. The other sought more to respond to 
the needs of men as they were realized iii their own 
experienee,?indi in doing so elicited their love and grati- 
tude as their voluntary benefactor. The philanthropy 

I. Four Phases of Morals. 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 25 1 

of the philosopher exhausted itself chiefly on one line 
of effort for the good of men; that of the Savior took 
a wide range through the whole realm of want and 
suffering, and proffered every variety of needed help. 

We have heard not a little of platonic love, ancient 
and modern — and the modern, for the most part, is 
but a sorry carricature of the ancient. As advocated 
and probably experienced by Plato, it was a genuine 
and pure affection. It was the attachment which 
exists between highly cultured and congenial spirits. 
The ideally perfect was the abstract object of this 
love. 

As a matter of fact, Plato's philanthropy, if such it 
may be called, had severe limitations. He looked 
upon the ignorant masses with little more affection or 
interest than upon so many mere animals. There was 
no human feeling he would not quickly sacrifice to a 
cold perfection of character, suited to his ideal. 

Jesus, very unlike Plato, cared little for speculative 
philosophy. The happiness of mankind depends upon 
the sensibilities — upon the state of the affections, more 
than upon the intellect or knowledge, and he is drawn 
towards men because of their capacities for happiness. 
These he finds in all men — hardly less in the lowest, 
than the highest, and all men, therefore, come within 
the range of his beneficence. 

His was a true philanthropy. It embraced human 
nature as it is, with its manifold imperfections and ten- 
dencies to evil. It touched every human capacity for 
goodness. ^ 



252 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Jesus saw what Plato did not see, and what very 
many since his day have failed to see, that there is a 
divinity within every human being, that allies him with 
the divine — powers and capacities which, when properly 
adjusted, qualify him for heirship in the kingdom of 
heaven ; and he was drawn to him by a sympathy that 
laid head, and hand, and heart, under contribution for 
his bettering. 

Moses was a true son of Israel, a great hero, and 
more than any other gave direction and destiny to the 
Hebrew people. Renowned for his learning, for his 
executive ability, and for his devotion to his enslaved 
countrymen, he is yet more remarkable as their great 
law-giver; and, as such, displayed a wisdom that easily 
places him above all other men of that distant age. 
He carried his people ever on his heart. For their 
sake ^'he refused to be called the son of Pharoah's 
daughter." He determined to share their fate and to 
perish with them, if perish they must. How he aroused 
them to a sense of their condition ; how he organized 
them, and eventually precipitated them, in one mighty 
exodus, across the sea, into the wilderness, has come 
down to us through tradition and history, and the 
heroism and fidelity he displayed have no equal among 
the rulers of nations. 

But his great trial had not yet come. His people 
had seen him giving up all for them, facing every dan- 
ger, and enduring every hardship, and, if they can do 
nothing else, they will, at least, thank him and be 
grateful to him for giving them freedom. Alas ! They 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 253 

suddenly find themselves in new relations, and begin 
to demur and complain. They miss their ''leeks and 
onions." They long for the ''flesh-pots of Egypt," for 
which, already, they seem willing to exchange the 
liberty he had procured for them at such personal cost 
and danger ! They utterly apostatize — become openly 
disloyal and charge him with folly for bringing them on 
their way to Canaan. They give themselves over to 
dissipation and idolatry, until the ire of heaven is kin- 
dled and is ready to consume them. Did Moses give 
the ingrate hosts of Israel over to destruction? No. 
Hear him: "Ye have sinned a great sin, and now I 
will go up unto the Lord, peradventure I shall make 
an atonement for your sin." Very kind of you, good 
Moses. And Moses returned unto the Lord and said : 
"O, this people have sinned a great sin, and have 
made them gods of gold, yet nov/, if thou wilt, forgive 
their sin, and if thou wilt not, blot me, I pray thee, 
out of thy book, which thou hast written !" 

No greater love can one have for another than that 
he should be willing to die for him, and this love Moses 
had for his long-cherished but ungrateful people. And 
that, too, was an early dark age, when such instances 
of moral heroism were unknown. Generous, noble 
Moses! Thou hast honored humanity. The world 
will not forget thee. Thirty centuries have not dimmed 
the glory that adorns thy brow. 

It is to be noticed, however, that the affection of 
Moses for his people is something less than the broad 
philanthropy of Jesus. If, on occasions, he displayed 



254 THE NEW RELIGION. 

a chivalrous sense of right and justice, and a meas- 
ureless love, yet his affection was Jewish in its color, 
not to say limited to his own people. The extreme 
measures to which he felt himself compelled to resort, 
in executing his great trust, the indiscriminate slaughter 
of women and children, and the utter annihilation of 
opposing tribes and nations are not, at this distance 
of time, to be harshly condemned. He was leading a 
peculiar and remarkable people, upon whom, as history 
has since proved, the well-being of subsequent gen- 
erations very largely depended, out of bondage to 
liberty. He was planting a harvest to be reaped and 
garnered through the coming centuries. Account for 
it as we may, the human race has hitherto made pro- 
gress only through blood and carnage. What the dire 
necessities of human progress are, who can yet tell? 
Somehow he knew, or at least believed, it was God's 
will and purpose that he should do as he did, bloody 
and merciless as his course seemed to be. If, however, 
we grant that his horrible massacres of Ammonite and 
Perizite were justifiable, it will yet appear that the 
human affection of Moses exhausted itself chiefly upon 
his own people. His language and bearing were con- 
stantly '^If ye shall diligently keep all these com- 
mandments, to do them, to love the Lord your God, 
to walk in all his ways, and to cleave unto him, then 
will the Lord drive out all these nations from before 
you, and ye shall possess greater nations and mightier 
than yourselves." (Exod. ii: 22, 23.) 

Jesus, too, was a son of Israel, and on occasion^ 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 255 

signified a peculiar attachment for his own people. 
His lament over Jerusalem is a pathetic expression of 
such attachment. It was but natural that he should 
be drawn to a people through whom ^'AU the nations 
of the earth were to be blessed." He offered them 
first, ^'glad tidings of great joy," influenced, perhaps, 
by his peculiar love for them, but chiefly, no doubt, 
because they had the scriptures, and the promise of 
the Messiah, and he, therefore, might hope to find 
with them, an open door of opportunity and easy 
entrance on his mission. But his philanthropy was 
not confined to the Jewish nation. In the face of the 
shame and humiliation which other Jews would have 
felt, he went forth to Samaritan and Gentile, even the 
poorest and most debased, with his message of love 
and kindly ministries. No caste or race prejudice 
could restrain his world-embracing sympathy. No 
suffering son of man or daughter of affliction, no sin- 
scarred abandoned mortal whom he did not carry on 
his heart with all the fidelity and affection which Moses 
had cherished for the one people of his love. 

The Son of Man has been compared with the fabu- 
lous Sakya Mouni. 

The one was born a peasant, the other a prince. 

The Hindu abandoned his home and fortune to become 
a devout recluse in the wilderness, and afterward the 
founder of Buddhism. He lived, according to tradi- 
tion, about six hundred years before the Christian 
era. 

Disgusted with the whole system of caste, which 



256 THE NEW RELIGION. 

played such a conspicuous part among the Brahmins, 
he threw the whole weight of his great influence 
against it. He saw in every human being that which 
made him kin to himself ; and more, he saw in every 
living, creeping thing, a transmigrating spirit, once a 
man, now a soul in process of purification. ' 

He was thoroughly unselfish, and in this respect 
resembled the founder of the Christian system. He 
was born a Brahmin, as Jesus was born a Jew, and 
both became great reformers, one of Brahminism, the 
other of Judaism, of ethics and religion the world 
over. 

As philanthropists they had less in common than 
we have been taught to believe. 

The kinship of Buddha to animated nature was the 
kinship of law and relation, and not that of personal 
sentiment and capacity. He could find nothing author- 
izing or justifying the caste system of the Brahmins. 
The spirit of every living thing, and of course man 
included, was an emanation in kind from the divine 
spirit, and hence the universal kinship of animated 
nature. Any pretension to natural superiority or pre- 
rogative was pure assumption, and hence the whole 
caste system is rotten at the core. 

But the brotherhood of the Buddhist is kinship, 
without reciprocity, without philanthrop}^ 

Rest, absolute, eternal rest is the condition of final 
blessedness — Nirwana. 

Philanthropy itself is a passion, and incompatible 
with repose. It senci^ men out to help others — to 



THE CHRIST CHARACTER. 257 

heal the sick, to open Wind eyes, to unstop deaf ears, 
to help the fatherless and the widow, to visit the sick 
and them that are in prison. It is attended with some- 
thing of care and anxiety. In its essence it is action 
and not rest. It is incompatible with the Buddhist 
thrjory of the ideal good. 

Buddha was tired — tii-ed of soul and must rest, as 
an exhausted man must sleep. That which prevents 
sleep — rest — must be withdrawn, annihilated. Desire, 
sensibility prevents rest — is itself active and incom- 
patible with rest of soul. Buddha philanthropy, if 
philanthropy it may be called, having attained its per- 
fection, visits no prisons, cared for no widows and 
orphans, built no almshouses. 

All are united in the same march of events, all are 
destined to the same goal — let the all-embracing stream 
of life flow smoothly onward in its deep channel, but 
avoid the submerged rocks, that break the surface into 
splashing white caps, or hurl the flood into eddying 
whirlpools beneath. Desire is the very devil of infe- 
licity. Alas, this eternal unrest and toil of the spirit ! 
When shall we be done with it and the soul be per- 
mitted to rest ? This was Sakya Mouni. 

How different from all this was Jesus, needs hardly 
to be said. 

He enters upon life with the divine passion 
aflame in his heart. He did not seek to destroy emo- 
tion, passion, desire, but to temper and direct them. 
A soul without these sensibilities would be as destitute 
pind incapable of happiness as a ray of light. In his 



258 THE NEW RELIGION. 

own experience, conscience was supreme, and love 
reigned — love toward God and love toward men. And 
to this complexion he sought to bring all men, with 
what fidelity and devotion let Gethsemane and the 
cross witness. 

As Sakya Mouni has been delivered to us, he is 
bewilderingly great — great in self-abnegation, great as 
a reformer, great as a speculative and religious m3^stic — 
but with such a monstrous misconception of human 
hfe and duty as to vitiate his influence, and render it 
doubtful whether, after all, he were more a blessing 
than a curse to the world. 

Jesus assumed that life is worth living, and worth 
saving, and he gave himself to the task of readjusting 
its forces, and making it a harmony in the universe of 
God. His whole being throbbed with affection for 
poor humanity. He consecrated himself to the service 
of mankind, and, giving all, obedient to the behests 
of his und3ang love for the race, he went down through 
trial and suffering, to death. And now, after nineteen 
centuries, he is hailed as the Savior of men by the 
most enlightened nations of the earth. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

The Christ Mission Outlined. 

It is time now to inquire specifically what was the 
mission of the Lord Jesus Christ to this world. He 
had a specific mission and he must have known well 
what it was. The angel said, ^^thou shalt call his 
name Jesus, savior, for he shall save his people from 
their sins. " Matt, i: 21. 

The Evangelist tells us that God sent him — 
^^that whosoever believeth on him should * have 
everlasting life. " Jno. 3: 16. 

Jesus himself says: 

*^My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, 
and to finish his work," whatever that may have been. 
See Jno. 4: 34. 

^'He that heareth my word and believeth on him 
that sent me hath everlasting life." Jno. 5: 24. Not 
shall have, but hath. ^T can of mine own self do 
nothing; as I hear I judge, and my judgment is just, 
because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the 
Father which hath sent me." Jno. 5: 30. He is 
under commission. 

The work which the Father hath given me to finish, 
the same work I do — under commission — and they 
bear witness of me. Jno. 5: 36. 



26o THE NEW RELIGION. 

^^No man cometh to me except the Father draw 
him; and I will raise him up at the last day." Jno. 
6: 44. Will raise him up. 

^^My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me." 
Jno. 7: 16. Under commission. 

''I must work the works of him that sent me while it 
is day. The night comath when no man can work." 
Jno. 9: 4. 

^^The Father which sent me, he gave me a com- 
mandment, what I should say, and what I should 
speak." Jno. 12: 49. 

^^The word which ye hear is not mine, but the 
Father's which sent me." Plainly under commission. 
Jno. 14: 24. 

From these declarations of Jesus, and others of 
similar import, we must learn the purposes of the 
Father in sending his beloved Son to this world. 
Jesus tells us in so many words why he came. 

^^I came "^ to call * sinners to repentance. " Mark. 
2: 17; Luke 5: 32. 

''I came not to judge the w^orld, but to save the 
world." Jno. 12: 47. 

^^I came not to be ministered unto, but to minister 
and to give my life a ransom for many." Mark 10: 45. 

^'Let us go into the next towns, that I ma}^ preach 
there also, for therefore I am come forth." Mark 

i: 38. 

He was explicit in stating that the Father had sent 
him; that he came under commission to do certain 
^^works;" to represent the Father in his character 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 261 

and feelings toward men, and through his hfe and 
teaching to point the way to the Kingdom of Heaven 
—to be the '^way/' the '^truth'' and the ''Uie.'' 

The prophet had said: ''The Spirit of the Lord is 
upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the 
gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the 
broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, 
and recovering of sight to the blind; to set at liberty 
them that are bruised; to preach the acceptable year 
of the Lord." Isaiah 6i: i. Having gone into the 
synagogue and read this passage, he said, all eyes 
being fixed upon him, ''This day is this scripture ful- 
filled in your ears." See Luke 4: 18-21. 

In summing up his work at the close of his mission 
he said: 

"It behooved Christ to suffer and to rise from the 
dead * that repentance and remission of sins should 
be preached in his name among all nations." Luke 
24: 46, 47. 

The Jews had long lived in expectation of a great 
deliverer. The old theocracy had passed away, their 
kings were dead, and they had passed under the 
Roman yoke; and their only hope, as set forth by the 
prophets Isaiah, Daniel and others, was in the com- 
ing Messiah. 

Answering to this expectation, Jesus is announced 
as the child of prophecy and claims to have come 
to open up and establish the kingdom foretold by the 
prophets. 

He assures them that this kingdom is at hand. 



262 THE NEW RELIGION. 

From this collection of facts and others akin and 
confirmatory, we must make up our ideal of the mis- 
sion of Jesus Christ to the world, so far, at least, as 
he himself and his four biographers have set it forth. 

He was to ^^save men from sin" by whatever 
means. This was the general purpose and final 
object of his coming. Through him in some way men 
were to attain ^^everlasting life," and be ^ ^raised up at 
the last day." 

He explicitly asserts that he came to ^^call sinners 
to repentance," ^^to preach the gospel to the poor," 
*'to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to 
the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind ^ the 
acceptable year of the Lord." 

If it is thought that Paul and other writers of the 
New Testament, more under the influence and power of 
the old Judaic cultus than was he, have indicated other 
offices and purposes of his mission, let us leave them 
to the criticism and judgment of the theologians, to 
whose ability and learning no pretensions are here 
made. We seek to know only what the Christ mis- 
sion was as he himself understood it, and what he 
himself taught us as to our relations to it. 

By common consent to save m.en from sin must 
mean to bring them to turn from sin, to eschew the 
wrong, to covet the good; it must mean to bring them 
into relations of loyalty to the divine government, 
into harmony with the moral order of the universe. 
Between the alien and rebellious sinner, and the good 
God, and all else that is fsfood, there must be effected 



THE CHRIST MISSION^ 263 

an at-one-ment, a permanent harmony. To this con- 
summation all professing Christians look, though they 
do so under the lights and shadows of various theories 
as to the means and mo dies operandi. 

What, then, is it from which men need to be saved? 
What must be done to bring the creature into har- 
monious relations with the Creator? 

1. In the ordinary experience of men there is some 
consciousness of guilt before God — an abiding con- 
viction that something is not right, something has 
been done which ought not to have been done — a 
sense of ill-desert, that causes unrest and trouble of 
spirit, a ghost of apprehension, if not of condemnation, 
that will not down. This state of mind must be 
replaced by one of mental rest and satisfaction. 

2. Between the unregenerate and the Holy Spirit 
of God there is little or no congeniality. The sinful 
and the wicked do not enjoy the presence and society 
of the pure and good. They are wont to slink away and 
hide themselves. They are out of their element, as 
is a fish out of water. They are, as Paul puts it, 
without hope and without God in the world. They 
are living in their lower nature, and must be brought 
out of it ere they can realize the higher joys of which 
man is capable. This congeniality and reciprocity 
must be established to make the best form of human 
happiness possible. 

3. And then, there comes into tne life of every one 
a conscious sense of helplessness — hours of suffering 
and disappointment, in which the soul imperatively 



264 THE NEW RELIGION. 

needs what no human hand can give — needs to rest 
down upon one who can and who will render support, 
who will keep and protect till the storm be over — • 
past. This sense of the divine helpfulness is to be 
realized. 

4. So much done, there must yet be imparted 
such strength and temper of spirit as will enable the 
individual to maintain his regenerate life in the face 
of temptation and opposition, with all its fruitions 
and prerogatives, as he goes forward in the journey 
Oi the world-life to its close. 

5. Finally, every one knows, when he pauses to 
reflect, that the present sensuous life is ebbing away — 
that time flies, and death comes, and he needs to 
know that there will be no break in his conscious 
being at death, that, -^if a man die, he shall live 
again '' And he wants to know this with something 
ot more assurance than mere reason and philosophy 
can give. 

Such are the needs which men realize in the present 
state of being — needs to which response must be made 
if men are to be saved. 

To work out, or to aid in working out, these results 
foi mankind wc will now assume that the Divine Son 
01 Man sent 01 the Father, came to this world. 
Whac was his programme? What, as a matter of 
fact, did he do? 

One 01 his biographers in concluding his history 
says — inauiging a strong hyperbole: 

^*And there are also many other things which Jesus 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 265 

did, the which, if they should be written, every one 
of them, I suppose that even the world itself could 
not contain the things that should be written." Jno. 
21: 25. 

We are not permitted to know all that Jesus did, 
but we know in part, and, it may be safely assumed, 
that whatever he did, and whatever he said, was 
done and said with a view of furthering the salvation 
of men — the one great purpose of his mission. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

The Christ — A Revelation. 

^^O that I knew where I might find him" — the cry 
of the much-aiHicted old Patriarch, has been the cry 
of all the ages. To ^^find him/' has been the quest 
of all philosoph}^, the one hope of all religion — the 
inextinguishable yearning of the human soul. 

"Nearer my God to thee, 
Nearer to thee." 

But ^^Who b}^ searching can find out God?" 
What did the Egyptian give us, pushing his quest 
and leading the thought of the world through the long 
centuries of his culture? What did the mystic Brah- 
min, spurning the earth and aspiring to be with the 
gods, give us, during all the cycling centuries, which 
he claims to have been his ? What did Greek philoso- 
phy, born of genius, give us? What is the ^^Ra" of 
Egypt, or the ^'BRAHM^'of India, or the ^^One" of Greek 
philosophy, but a dim abstraction, without form and 
void? 

^'The heavens declare the glory of God. " Yes, they 
do. And, as we turn our telescopes upon them, and 
know more of law, and light, and electricit}^, they 
become all more glorious. But the glory of God is 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 267 

not God. All nature smiles in radiant beauty under 
the lambent touches of the king of day ; but all nature 
is not God. 

The raging of our own Niagara tells of power. The 
thunder and the storm tell us of power. The mighty 
orbs that were flung into the upper deep, to count 
their mighty revolutions on and on forever, tell us of 
power, more than we can conceive ; hut J^ower is not 
God. The light fitted to the eye and suited to leaf 
and flow^er tells us of wisdom ; but wisdom is not 
God. 

Wisdom and power exhaust the category of the 
divine attributes, as manifested in the heavens, that 
declare the glory of God, and in the firmament that 
showeth his handiwork. 

But out of the depths there come other voices — 
voices of sentiment, of love, of conscience, venera- 
tion, justice, of sympath}^, of gratitude. Are these 
the voices of God sounding out of the depths ? Whence 
come these voices? 

Light and heat wake to life the sleeping germ. They 
expand the bud, and paint the rose, and the unseen air 
bears to us its fragrance. But do they tell us of feel- 
ings of joy, or grief? Electricity can reawaken the 
dead and start it into momentary phenomenal life and 
activity. Can it inform us of intent, or of duty, or of 
worship? 

^^O that I knew where I might find him !" 

The Son of Man — Son of God — came out of the 
depths, which thought had essayed in vain to explore. 



268 THE NEW RELIGION. 

The conception of the divine being prevalent in the 
Old Religions is thoroughly mystical, and to the last 
degree obscure and confusing. Their most enlight- 
ened worship was the worship of the Greeks at Mars 
Hill — worship of the ^ ^Unknown God." 

In Judaism we have a definable and palpable Mono- 
theism. The God of the Jew is one God. ^^He 
inhabiteth eternity, and dwelleth in the uttermost parts 
of the earth. '^ 

Unlike the supreme beings of other religions, he was 
conceived of as holding intimate and familiar relations 
with his creature man, and because of his imminence 
and constant providence, his power to awe and restrain 
men was supremely great. 

But his character as it stood in the mind of the 
ancient Jew approaches that of a despot, conscious 
of unlimited power, and holding universal dominion. 
He is the one Almighty Being, more to be feared than 
loved. As in the older religions, fear held sw^ay as a 
motive to obedience. The ^^fear of the Lord" was 
regarded as ^^the beginning of wisdom;' ' and the destruc- 
tion frequently hurled against idolatrous nations, gave 
ample sanction to the comprehensive injunction, ^'Fear 
God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole 
duty of man." 

The unique and wonderful Son of Man came out of 
the depths to show us God — the All-Father. 

The Prophet seven hundred years before had said, 
He shall be called Immanuel — God with us. It was 
his to bring within the range of our sense-appreheii- 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 269 

sion the attributes of the Heavenly Father, in so far, 
at least, as they stand related to our well-being. A 
mere verbal revelation was not enough. There must 
be an acted-living revelation, if men are to be reached 
and rescued. To the extent of our needs ^^all power 
in heaven and on earth" are given to him. He imper- 
sonates the Father. What he did the Father did 
through him. What he said the Father said. In his 
capacity as the Father's vicegerent, he is one with the 
Father — Immanuel. 

From him we learn not only that wisdom is of God, 
and that power is of God, but we learn what had never 
been known or imagined, if we except the Judaic cult, 
that sentiment — affection — feeling are of God. 

From him we learn that God loves all men. 

From him we learn that, as the embodiment and 
impersonation of all that is good, we should love God 
supremely. 

That, as equal to ourselves in all tho capacities for 
goodness, and destined to the same eternity of being, 
we should love our fellowmen as we love ourselves. 

That, in God's estimate and order of things, love 
fulfills all moral obligation, and that its presence as a 
ruling sentiment constitutes the one condition of 
human well-being and happiness. 

From him we learn that a man weighted down 
with sensuous appetencies and exposed to torturing 
temptations, may be fortified and helped — may be 
l^rought to the birth of a new life — may emerge into a 



270 THE NEW RELIGION. 

more spiritual and higher state of being, even in the 
present life, and enter into the kingdom of heaven. 

From him we learn that true penitence avails to 
break the power of sin, to purge the soul from a con- 
demning sense of conscious unworthiness as a sinner 
before God ; that he who comes to see the folly of sin 
may fly from it, and not remain forever cursed on 
account of vows broken and sins already committed — 
that penitent prodigals may return to the Father's 
house. 

From him we learn that the innocence and goodness 
which characterize the child and constitute its heaven, 
is indispensable to the adult as a qualification for the 
same heaven; that the penitent, humble poor and 
downtrodden shall sometime be vindicated, and that 
they that mourn shall be blessed. 

From him we learn that God is not the God of the 
dead, but of the living — that there are no dead. From 
him we learn all these things, and more — things hitherto 
unknown, or but half known at best. 

Thou blessed Christ, we thank thee for these revela- 
tions. They lift the clouds and purify the air we 
breathe. They remove great burdens from our shoulders. 

We had thought we must placate the gods, build 
shrines, offer sacrifices, make weary pilgrimages. We 
did not know that to the Almighty belong moral attri- 
butes — parental feeling — and that he needs not to be 
placated with sacrifices and blood ; that he is, in fact, 
our Father in heaven^ and that he loves us as his 
children. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 



271 



We thank thee, thou blessed Christ, that thou hast 
revealed the Father's love. We knew it not; we were 
afraid of God. We knew something of his power, 
and in the dark hours we thought his wrath was upon 
us, and we looked into the grave without hope. 

We knew not the way of life. We were blind and 
went groping in the dark. But thou hast brought to 
light, with the Father's love, ^^life and immortality." 

We should \vdive known that he who stands at the 
portals of life, sustaining our breathing and our heart- 
beats, was the Almighty Father, attentively caring for 
us, but we did not ; it had not occurred to us, and we 
lifted up no gratitude for his goodness. 

He that hath seen me hath seen the Father. The 
spirit that I manifest ; the interest and affection that 
I have had in you and exhibited toward you are his 
interest, his affection. Can it be possible ? Is this an 
exhibition of the Heavenly Father's solicitude and" 
care for poor humanity? Yes. He that hath seen 
me hath seen the Father. We have seen the blessed 
Christ going in and out among men, helping the needy, 
healing the sick, comforting the mourner, giving hope 
and courage to the down-trodden and despairing. We 
saw thee on the ^^mount" and heard thy gracious 
words. We saw thee with the religiously per- 
plexed and disconsolate woman at the well — with the 
penitent adulteress — at the bier of the widow of Nain — 
with the sisters of Bethany, weeping at the grave of 
their brother. Yes, thou Lamb of God, we saw thee 
in Gethsemane and on the cross, and heard thy dying 



272 THE NEW RELIGION. 

prayer, ^'Father, forgive them," and now thou dost 
assure us that he that hath seen me hath seen the 
Father ! 

We have been told that Jesus made no contributions 
to our knowledge. 

The allusion in such a statement must be to a tech- 
nical knowledge of physical science. 

It is not claimed that Jesus was a ^ ^scientist." But 
no philosopher or scholar of any respectability or 
regard for truth will say that he made no valuable 
contributions to the * ^science" of ethics and religion. 

He brought to light — and let him deny who will — 
new conceptions of the divine being, new estimates of 
the value of love as a factor of well-being, new ideals 
of worship and a more correct view of the relations 
that men sustain to each other and to God, the possi- 
bility of a rapid transformation of moral character, a 
better ideal of the relation of male and female, and the 
sanctity of marriage, and to mention no more, a more 
worthy conception of the true dignity of man and a 
more rationally certified hope of life and well-being 
in the hereafter. 

It need not here be said that these revelations 
opened up to men a '^New Heaven" and a ''New 
Earth." 

It is not, after all, to be wondered at that the Son 
of Man so profoundly impressed mankind. Such 
astounding revelations could hardly do less. It is 
only wonderful that men should be so slow to awake 
to a proper recognition of what the good ''Father in 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 273 

Heaven," and the '^Only Son" have done for the 
world. 

It is sometliing humiliating to know that as early as 
the fourth century, men holding the written life of 
Jesus in hand, could proceed to build up the most 
gigantic despotism the world ever saw. 

It is humiliating to know that the best scholars and 
the best men of the world holding this book in hand, 
could submit for a i,ooo years to this remorseless 
world-embracing despotism, without a protest that 
would shake the earth and wake the dead. 

It is not creditable to the sixteenth century intelligence 
that Christians having wrested this book, all radiant 
with the revelations of God, from the hands of the 
Pope, should be satisfied with a reform so partial and 
imperfect. 

It is not creditable to the eighteenth century intelli- 
gence, that the churches, with this book upon their 
altars, should retain anything of the old Judaic and 
Pagan priesthood with its effete functions — that they 
should retain anything of the essentially heathen belief, 
^hat the great God can be conciliated by the offering 
of slain victims, and ^^shed blood," with only a diver- 
sion as to the dramatis per sonce of the offering. 

It compromises the religious intelligence of this age 
that even Protestants can shrink themselves into a 
comprehensive externalism, and go statedly through 
the ceremonial and ritualistic services of the temple, 
and imagine that, in so doing, they are par excellence 
serving God ; while in the Roman and Greek churches, 



274 '*'"''' N^^ RELIGION. 

we have heathenism in full chorus! If the divine 
Son of Man were again to speak to us in audible terms, 
would he not say ^^How long shall I bear with you? 
How long shall I suffer you?" 

In the name of the Only Begotten, let Christians 
awake out of the sleep of a dead formalism, and 
return to the ^ 'mount of vision," where Jesus left his 
disciples at Pentecost. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

The Ministry of Doctrine. 

According to views just presented, the life of the 
^^Son of Man" was an acted and perpetual revelation. 
His teaching, therefore, on any subject and on all sub- 
jects, indeed, must be accepted as true and authori- 
tative, if properly understood. 

But here comes in some difficulty, especially to us 
Westerners, whose habits of thought and modes of 
expression are so different from those of the Orientals. 

We have dropped from the gorgeous realm of tropes 
and metaphors to the flat bottom of a prosy, matter- 
of-fact literalism, and we find it difficult to render the 
poetry of the Orient into the prose of the Occident. 

Who eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, hath 
eternal life! He that eateth my flesh and drinketh 
my blood, dwelleth in me and I him! And yet, with 
attention to differences in modes of thinking, we shall 
be able to make the translation more or less correct. 

Another precaution seems necessary. God is 
revealed as a spirit. That which exists on the plane 
of the material is not God. The revelations of the 
Son of God deal with the spiritual. 

God the Father, man the creature. The kinship 



276 THE NEW RELIGION. 

between them is a kinship of spirit with spirit, of 
thought with thought, of feehng with feehng. 

Largely overlooking the merely physical and per- 
ishable, the Son of Man proceeds upon a plane of 
exalted spirituality. He deals with the ^^^ternal 
verities." If he is interested in a cup of cold water, 
it is because that cup is the blossoming out and fruit- 
age of a temper and disposition which constitute 
heaven in the soul. 

If reason and conscience and love do not predomi- 
nate and exclude idolatrous devotion to the distract- 
ing temporary concerns of the lower life, we shall fail 
to comprehend this '^Teacher come from God." 

^^The natural man receiveth not the things of the 
spirit of God — they are foolishness unto him. He 
cannot know them, for they are spiritualty discerned." 

And here precisely lies the difficulty with the skep- 
tical critics of the Founder of Christianit}/. Living 
habitually in the arit^ regions of speculative thought, 
and concerned chiefly with the present ^ ^world-life," 
they have failed to apprehend the true significance of 
his teaching at many points. 

Man is at his best when his whole nature, intellec- 
tual, moral and spiritual, is in full play, when con- 
science asserts the divine presence and prerogative, 
when the affections are duly subordinated to the law 
of right, and take hold on things spiritual, and the 
soul, throbbing with glad emotion, is lifted out of the 
gross and sensuous and borne heavenward. Then it is 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 277 

that the words and thoughts of Jesus become ''words 
that breathe," and ''thoughts that burn." 

He addressed himself chiefly to the affectional 
nature, as we all know, and he must be approached 
on the line and in the spirit of his teaching if one 
would get into rapport with him, and become able to 
properly understand and appreciate his teaching. 

In his review of the best thought of his age Jesus 
pointed out certain errors and indicated certain prin- 
ciples of morality which had never before been 
enunciated. 

It is altogether probable that much of his teaching 
has not been transmitted to us in form or in fact; but 
the more striking and impressive, and probably the 
more important passages have been recorded. 

I. In review of the Mosaic teaching he says, Ye have 
heard that it has been said "an eye for an eye and a 
tooth for a tooth" — evil for evil. This was the teach- 
ing, this the practice, this the impulse of unregener- 
ate humanity the world over. But he abruptly 
breaks this order. Do not do evil for evil. What 
then, do nothing? Not that. "But I say unto you * 
Bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate 
you, and pray for them who despitefuUy use you and 
persecute you!" 

But is such a course a reasonable one, and practicable 
in actual life? Will it do to assume that this doing 
good for evil will finally be appreciated, and prove to 
be the best thing that could have been done? Well, 
we know that seeing it done usually touches the hard- 



278 THE NEW RELIGION. 

est hearts. It stays the hand ready to strike. It 
checks revenge. It hardly fails to conquer peace. 
As a rule, it does all these, whereas, returning evil 
for evil stirs worse strife, summons resistance, embit- 
ters feeling, excites revenge and prolongs hatred and 
war. 

Is it not better to take the chances — appeal to the 
better nature, and return good for evil, and thus do 
the best and strongest thing in your power to reform 
and save the evil doer? So taught Jesus, whose mis- 
sion it was to save his people from their sins. 

He himself did good for evil. He did it when the 
world was against him, and there was little hope of 
final appreciation — when his own chosen ^^tw^elve" 
had left him. He did it, when to seeming, his cause 
went down out of sight, and he hung dying on the 
cross. 

But it is a new deal in morality. Too high for 
some, possibly for most men. Even that profound 
scholar and advanced thinker, John Stuart Mill, 
thought such a morality impracticable in actual life. 
Let them wait. Men are accepting it more and more. 
The evidence from history is not all in. More and 
more the folly of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a 
tooth is becoming apparent, more and more is it 
becoming evident that on this line of battle ^^one shall 
chase a thousand and two put ten thousand to flight." 

2. Infarther review of the Mosaic teaching, he brings 
out new ideals as to the position and the rights of 
woman. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 279 

*^In the beginning God made male and female. " ' ^And 
for this cause shall a man leave father and mother, 
and cleave to his wife; and they twain shall be one 
flesh." 

What then becomes of the boasted superiority of 
man? Whence his right to subordinate and enslave 
woman, as she has been in all lands and through the 
ages? Contrasted with all previous teaching this 
reads like a revelation from heaven. There is 
scarcely a trace of it to be found in history. The 
teaching in Genesis accounting for the origin of male 
and female was accepted, but the logical inferences 
which the Author of Christianity makes from it had 
never been made. Very soon after the creation, 
woman drops out of sight, only to appear again as a 
servile subordinate, toward whom any indignity may 
be offered with impunity. Polygamy and concubinage 
run riot under the eyes and in the immediate presence 
of Moses and the prophets. It is a distressing com- 
ment upon poor human nature, that, after i,goo 
years, so few have yet risen to the height of a view, 
so just, so human — and they twain shall be one flesh. 
The rights of women, as certified by the Author of 
Christianity, are coming to be recognized more and 
more, but even among professing Christians the 
admission that they twain shall be ''one flesh'' is 
grudgingly made, if made at all. 

Blessed Master, Ihou didst come to redeem and 
save the world, and thou art mightily lifting at least 



28o THE NEW RELIGION. 

one-half of it — aye, all of it — for as woman is lifted 
man is also lifted and saved. ^ 

Treasure in Heaven, 

3. As the conscience is awakened and becomes sensi- 
tive to the touches of sin, as the affections become 
pure, the thoughts take new range, one sees things in 
new lights, and the whole significance of life is 
changed. 

The Author of Christianity always insisted upon a 
purer morality — a higher life. There is a realm 
whence disastrous changes and uncertainty are ban- 
ished, and to this realm he would have men aspire. 

^^Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the 
earth where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where 
thieves break through and steal. But lay up for 
yourselves treasures in heaven. * * For where 
your treasure is, there will your heart be also." Matt. 
6: 19-21. 

This teaching, be it old or new, is squarely in the 
face of the world's activities. In an iron age — even 
in a silver and gold age — it can have little recognition 
among men. The average adventurer upon the sea 
of life will thrust it aside as the dictum of a dreaming 

I. The teaching of the Founder of the New Religion, that 
only one single ground of divorce is lawful, alike distinguishes his 
followers from both Jews and heathens of his day. He revolu- 
tionized society by giving to the family a sure foundation, and by 
the elevation of woman to be the true companion of man. Chris- 
tian Archaeology, by Bennett, p. 461. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 281 

enthusiast, and utterly incompatible with business 
life in this business world. 

We forget that we are children of the Father in 
heaven, and capable of holding high converse with 
him, that we are destined, very soon, to be withdrawn 
from the present environment. The lower life burns 
out while incubating the higher. The lower life, 
within its sphere, has its uses. But its uses are tem- 
porary, and it is liable to error. It is wont to busy 
itself constantly with momentary pleasures and Cheap 
entertainments. These entertainments and pleasures 
sometimes prove to be so fascinating as to draw upon 
the life forces above, and pervert them. They are, it 
must be admitted, very beguiling, and tend to draw 
us. down ward — to keep us on the plane of the lower 
life. 

The mad chase for gold is on throughout the wide 
world. Behold the struggle it engenders, always and 
everywhere! What does it prove?' It proves that 
most men are the victims of avarice. It proves that 
the lower life is master — that men are standing on the 
lower and not the higher plane of their being — that 
the glare of gold has blinded them to the spiritual 
possibilities of their nature — that they have not 
^'tasted of the good word of God and the powers of 
the world to come." They, indeed, know something 
of a crude and cheap friendship, but it usually has the 
taint of money. They know little or nothing of the 
true feast of reason and flow of soul sometimes real- 
ized by high-born congcjnial spirits. Such fellowship 



202 THE NEW RELIGION. 

is too high, for the professional money-getter. He 
cannot attain unto it. He is living in his lower nature, 
which admits of certain fervid ill-fragrant excitements, 
but yields no charismic exaltation. He is breathing 
an atmosphere that is heavy and choking, loaded with 
the rust and poison of selfishness, and the love of 
money. His feet are amid the swamps and quag- 
mires of the earth, earthy. He is to be pitied, since 
he knows not, or seems not to know, that there is 
anything better than money. There are many things 
better than money. When you are healthy and 
buoyant your dollar is worth its face, every cent of it. 
When you linger on a cheerless bed of protracted sick- 
ness and sufiering, from which all the money of the 
banks cannot lift you, your dollar is at discount. As 
your malady increases its discount increases. When 
you are looking into the grave, what is the value of 
your dollar, or a million of them? 

Money is at best but a cheap advantage. It can 
only buy what is of little worth, and cheap in the 
market. It cannot buy a friendship worth having. 
It cannot purchase 3^ou a restful and happy state of 
mind or a good character — a breath or touch of 
heaven. 

Better not lay it up. It will not keep long in any 
case. Rust will corrode it. Thieves may steal it. 

When love warms your heart and sweetens your 
temper, your thoughts are likely to take a range above 
money and money hunting. When gratitude for a life 
crowned with blessings wells up from the depths of 



THE CHRISr MISSION. 283 

your being, you are surmounting your lower nature. 
You are stepping well upon the borders of the upper 
kingdom, and earthly treasures are of little worth. 

Why do we so habitually shut our eyes to things 
eternal, and open them so eagerly and fix them so 
intently upon things perishable and of little worth? 
Somehow this tendency is upon us — upon some more 
and stronger than upon others, but upon us all. 
However, we have moments of aspiration and clearer 
light — moods let us call them — outcrops of the future 
life — foregleams of the coming day — flashes of disem- 
bodied spirit existence. There are few, perhaps none, 
w^ho have not had these moods — seasons of temporary 
exaltation — prophesies cf the hereafter. They have 
come in response to fervid prayer to God for a purer 
and better life. They have come, as they did in the 
olden time to Plato, in hours of solitary contempla- 
tion. They have come on occasions of sweet and 
holy converse of friend with friend — blessed anti- 
pasts of the Kingdom of Heaven. And in such 
moods how radiant and joyous is all nature; theheavens 
are more benignant, the landscape more charming, 
the foliage more gorgeous, the flowers sweeter. Even 
the bark of the distant dog, on his faithful watch, is a 
note of praise that reaches heaven. The lowing herd 
and the flitting songsters of the forest, and every 
sound that breaks upon the ambient air peal their 
grateful melodies into the ear of the Most High. 
How then does the ^*earth-earthy" sink into worth- 
^.ssness? What now of the money-grubbers and 



284 THE NEW RELIGION. 

notoriety mongers who are so busily digging to bury 
themselves deeper and deeper in the accumulations of 
earthy treasure? What ample proof the millionaire 
gives of short-sighted folly! How evident the damag- 
ing mistakes made by those who, like the great Alex- 
ander, are ambitious of earthly renown. Renown, the 
most flattering, is unsatisfying. It did not satisfy 
Alexander — did net bless him Living, he gave the 
largest proof of his mad foll}^, and dying he went off 
an impoverished bankrupt, a wreck into a shoreless 
sea. He died as the fool dies. The golden sands of 
Pactolus could not protect the proverbial Croesus 
against the determination of Cyrus to offer him in 
sacrifice to the Persian's God. And gold would not 
bless you, though, like Midas, you could turn every- 
thing you touch into gold. It would curse you. It 
cursed Midas until he besought the gods to smite him 
again with utter poverty, if need be, to save him from 
the curse of gold. 

What will it profit a man if he gain the whole world 
and lose his own soul? 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

The Ministry of Doctrine. 

In pursuance of his mission ^^Jesus began to preach, 
saying, repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at 
hand.' 

That repentance was somehow needful to reforma- 
tion was urgently taught in the Hebrew scriptures. 
^'If my people shall humble themselves and seek my 
face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I for- 
give their sins, and heal their land (2 Kings 7: 14). 
The Psalmist, whose enlarged views and exalted spir- 
ituality, exhibit the best phases of the Judaic cultus, 
prays : 

* ^ * * * O Lord 
Pardon my iniquity, for it is great. 

* * -jt ^ H? ^ 

Turn thou unto me, and have mercy upon me, 
For I am desolate, and afflicted. 

* -jf * * * ^ 

Have mercy upon me, O God, 
According to thy loving kindness. 

* -x- :i; * * * 
And cleanse me from my sin. 

* -X- :ic -X- * * 

The Lord is nigh unto them of a broken heart, 
And saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. 



286 THE NEW RELIGION. 

A broken and a contrite heart, 
O God, thou wilt not despise — 

From this cultus Jesus emerged as the '^Messiah/' 
commissioned to ^^save his people from their sins." 

John was in the wilderness of Judea calling upon 
men to repent — preparing the way of the Lord. The 
impassioned cry of John became the solemn injunction 
of Jesus — ''•Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at 
hand." Throughout his teaching great stress is laid 
upon the need of repentance. 

When he sent out the 12 and the 70, it was to call 
upon men to repent, as he himself had done, in their 
hearing (Mark 6-12); and later, Peter reproducing his 
teaching said, ^ ^Repent ye, therefore, and be con- 
verted, that your sins may be blotted out." Acts 3: 19. 

In summing up results just before his departure, 
alluding to what had been written concerning him in 
the Law of Moses and in the Prophets, and in the 
Psalms, Jesus said, ^^Thus it is written, and thus it 
behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead, 
that repentance and remission of sins should be 
preached in my name, to all nations." 

It must no: be forgotten that whatever discord may 
exist between the Almighty Father and any human 
being, it is chargeable to the man himself, because of 
wrongs done— of sins committed. If one is conscious 
of personal guilt, he has brought it upon himself. 
Like the Prodigal he has sinned, and like the Prodigal 
he must repent. The good Heavenly Father is ever 
ready to forgive and welcome the wanderer home. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 287 

What is it to sin, and what to repent ? We ought 
to be very clear on subjects of so much moment. 

To sin^ then, is to violate law, to go against the 
moral sense, to do what you know, or at least what 
you believe, to be wrong. It is to take up arms against 
conscience, to take sides with the bad against the 
good. 

Doing this, you cease to be loyal to the divine gov- 
ernment, you become a discord in the moral order, 
you become consciously unworthy and feel guilty. 
This is human experience, always and everywhere, at 
the inception of a sinful and vicious life. 

But what is it to repent, that so much emphasis is 
put upon it by the Great Teacher ? What can it be, 
but to lay down the arms you have taken up against 
conscience, to renounce sin, to eschcAV evil ? What 
is it, but to take the back track on your erring life, 
with the solemn purpose of reforming and making all 
possible amends, and thus resuming your place in the 
divine favor, or rather, perhaps, to experience such a 
sense of personal guilt and consciousness of ill-desert, 
on account of missteps taken and wrongs done, as will 
cause you to gladly do these things ? The one course 
in the very nature of things makes the other necessary. 
The one covers, and corrects the other, leaving you 
something damaged, indeed, and less than you other- 
wise would have been, because of opportunities lost, 
z^rA capacities unimproved, but yet reconciled with 
God, and in sympathy and harmony with all that is 
good. 



288 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Sooner or later there comes to most men, if not to 
all, a thoughtful and serious hour, in which they are 
wont to cast the horoscope of life descendant. They 
ponder upon the pathway they have trod. They ques- 
tion the oracles as to their fortune and destiny. They 
stand in the conscious presence of the inevitable. 
Perhaps they begin to realize that their feet are already 
^^taking hold on death," and are ready to cry out with 
the Publican, ^^God be merciful." Some great sorrow 
has come, recalling their thoughts to the uncertainty 
and insufficiency of all earthly good ; or, the exhibi- 
tion of some great but undeserved love, has sent a 
thrill of keen conviction to the heart ; or, it may be, 
that some faithful minister of the gospel, like the 
consecrated prophet on the banks of the Jordan, has 
effectually reached them with his warning cry ; or the 
^^still small voice" in the evening twilight, more pow- 
erful than ^^the rushing might}^ wind," has been heard 
in the solemn depths of the soul, calling them back to 
duty and to God. At any rate the moral and religious 
sense is at high-tide. Man is face to face with his 
destiny. The moment is auspicious for high resolve, 
and blessed is he who, in such an hour, takes resolu- 
tion to abandon sin and consecrate himself to good- 
ness and to God. 

Now, it is something of this plastic state of mind 
that Jesus seeks to bring in as the first condition need- 
ful to the uplifting and saving process. There must 
be some experience of sorrow for sin, some review of 
the past, uncovering its errors, an honest hour with 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 28g 

God and the truth, resulting, as it must, in a sense of 
guilt and unworthiness before God, if the future pos- 
sibilities of the higher life are to be realized. This, 
at least, is the postulate of the New Religion. 

At this point stoicism takes issue squarely with 
Christianity. 

It was the conceit of the stoics that one could reform 
himself simply by dint' of resolution, and stiffening up 
courage. With them sorrow for sin was a childish 
weakness. Seneca scouted penitence as unbecoming 
a manly character. ^^The calm of a mind, blessed 
with the consciousness of its own virtue, is the supreme 
expression of felicity." (Leckey, Hist. Mor.,voL i, p. 
207.) 

But alas ! Seneca, what about the disquietude and 
unrest of a mind conscious of its own vice ? And 
where, good Seneca, will you go to find one who has 
not had something of this experience with vice ? Is 
the pleasure of virtue more real to consciousness than 
the pain of vice? 

Jesus and Seneca were contemporaries, and lived 
under the same government- To Seneca, his Gali- 
lean contemporary would have said, ^^They that are 
whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. 
I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repent- 
ance. " 

Suppose, Seneca, you know yourself to have done 
wrong, as surely you must have known you were doing, 
when truckling to the wicked whims of the most 
vicious despot th«at ever disgraced a throne. Suppose 



290 THE NEW RELIGION. 

you already feel a damning sense of guilt and sin, 
such as very many men come to feel, what then? You can 
not by a mere edict of the will banish it ; what is your 
alternative ? You may disregard the voice of con- 
science, you may possibly hush its warnings, but in 
so far as you succeed in doing this, 3^ou break down 
your moral nature, and disqualify yourself for the 
enjoyment of those divine pleasures which spring from 
congenial fellowship with the pure, the good and the 
true. 

If you ignore and discard sorrow for sin, what will 
fortify any purpose to do right in the future ? How 
can you reassume your relations of loyalty to the right 
if no sorrow^ for wrong-doing has begotten within you 
a stronger motive to obedience ? 

Jesus says. Repent, give place to sorrow, examine 
your life in the light of your best knowledge, and with 
prayerful interest, seek to know the worst as God 
knows it. To do this is no evidence of weakness or 
want of manhood. 

Your sorrow is but the needed ministry of suffering — 
the condition and prophecy of your emancipation from 
sin. 

Nor is the result uncertain. That one comes up out 
of the ordeal of a true penitence, nobler and happier, is 
not an accident. 

When Jesus began to preach saying, ^'Repent for 
the kingdom of heaven is at hand," he announced the 
law of the spirit's emergence into higher forms of 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 29I 

life. Peter repeats it in form, ' 'Repent ye therefore and 
be converted." 

''How can it be?" Never mind, Nicodemus, it is 
so. "The wind bloweth where it hsteth, and you 
hear the sound thereof." "Marvel not." "Kf must 
be born again. " 

Most of us have seen men come out of this ordeal 
of penitence. What are the facts ? They come with 
smiles of joy playing over every feature, with expres- 
sions of thankfulness and gratitude, with a fathomless 
love that reaches out toward friends and foes, and 
takes in the world. 

And this process of redemption we have seen 
repeated so often, as to leave no doubt as to the law 
of regeneration. They come out of this ordeal "new 
creatures,' ' childlike, transparent, with new aspirations, 
new hopes and purposes. They experience new affini- 
ties and seek new associations. 

And Jesus evidently regarded all such penitents as 
already saved and worthy of confidence. If one sin 
against you forgive him. The penitent publican was 
"justified." The penitent adulteress was forgiven. 
The penitent thief on the cross was promised 
paradise. 

He did not exalt "faith," as did Luther ; nor the 
"blood," as does Moody, and orthodoxy in general. 
It seemed to be enough that the sinner should be 
penitent as the prodigal was penitent. It was not 
necessary that he should go round and round through 
the wilderness of ecclesiastical dogma and sacraments, 



:^92 THE NEW RELIGION. 

nor to halt at the dead sea of forms and ceremony — 
*^the kingdom is at hand." 

In a case given expressly to illustrate the way out 
of sin and return to virtue, sketched by the Master's 
own hand, the prodigal son is made to reviev/ his past 
life, the favors slighted, the opportunities lost ; and 
the dire necessities of a life of sin, are made to bring 
the erring wanderer to himself, and in the spirit of 
true penitence he determines to go back to his father 
and say to him, '^Father, I have sinned against heaven 
and before thee ; I am no more worthy to be called 
thy son. Make me as one of thy hired servants. 
And the father seeing him runs to meet him and wel- 
come him home." No priestly ^^absolution" nor '^39 
Articles." ^^No slain lamb or bleeding victim." 

Among the angels in heaven and the angels on 
earth there is ^^joy over one sinner that repenteth." 

As a matter of fact this Christian view of the virtue 
of repentance as adequate to exculpate the offender 
from further blame, is accepted and acted on by men 
generally. If one do you a wrong, to accomplish 
some selfish purpose, you have reason for feeling that 
he should be punished for it some way. But let him 
repent and prove to you true sorrow, and 3^ou not onl}^ 
readily forgive him, but your confidence in his essen- 
tial moral integrity is restored. This is the experience 
of all honorable, fair-minded men. Throughout Juda- 
ism and Christianity, at least, it is recognized as the 
sufficient ground of forgiveness and restoration to the 
divine favor. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 293 

It is not claimed that penitence, however deep and 
sincere, operates to lessen the divine abhorrence of 
sin, or that one having sinned can, through repent- 
ance, recover all that he lost through sinning ; but 
only that he will be lifted out of the conscious con- 
demnation and wretchedness which weighs upon him 
during his alienation from God. He returns to his 
loyalty to the right, not to be what he might have 
been, but yet, to be at peace with conscience, and in 
harmony with all that is good. The end of law is 
universal harmony. This end has been attained 
through penitence and reformation of life, and what 
more do men, or angels, or God require ? 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

The Ministry of Doctrine. 

Reformation of life by means of moral precept and 
education is always tediously slow and often far from 
satisfactory. 

Jesus had less to say in favor of such reformatory 
means than most masters. 

About the only hope held out by him to the habitual 
sinner is the possibility of his regeneration. He did 
not indoctrinate him in ethics, did not teach him 
science, but called upon him to repent. 

If a rapid, not to say an instantaneous transforma- 
tion of the moral character, be impossible, then at 
least one of the chief postulates of the New Religion 
is unfounded, and Christianity sinks well nigh to the 
level of the Older Religions. 

Born only of the flesh you may tramp the world- 
life through to its end on a very low plane of being. 
And you need more than education and good advice. 
To realize your destiny as a child of the Heavenly 
Father, you must escape from the chrysalis of the 
merely sensuous life and take your place among the 
immortals. Education is not enough. 

If those vicious tastes and dispositions of yours, 
which take pleasure in domestic and social disorder^ 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 295 

in conscienceless greed and unjust gain, in mere sen- 
suous and degrading indulgence of tastes, and disposi- 
tions which make history so largely a record of crime 
— if the flaming appetites and passions which, upon 
the least temptation, hurl you into every species of 
excessive indulgence, cannot be replaced by some- 
thing better, then plainly there can be no heaven for 
3/0U in earth or sky. Mere education and precept, 
such as the Old Masters relied on, are not enough. 
The plummet must drop to the bottom. Marvel not 
that I said unto you, ye must be born again. 

As to the character and extent of the needed trans- 
formation of life, there is diversity of experience and 
diversity of opinions — opinions which vary somewhat 
with the theories of human depravity. 

The author of ^ ^Natural Law in the Spiritual World" 
frankly states the necessities involved in conversion 
under the ^^Total Depravity" theory of the orthodox 
churches. 

*^The attitude of the natural man, with reference to 
the spiritual, is a subject on which the New Testa- 
ment is equally pronounced. Not only in relation to 
the spiritual man, but to the whole spiritual world 
the natural man is regarded as dead. He is as a crys- 
tal to an organism. The natural world is to the 
spiritual as the inorganic to the organic. *To be car- 
nally minded is death.'' ^Thou hast a name to live 
but art dead.' ^She that liveth in pleasure is dead 
while she liveth.' ^To you hath he given life^ which 
were dead in trespasses and in sins.' " Again he says: 



296 THE NEW kELlGION. 

'^It is an old-fashioned theology which divides the 
world in this way — which speaks of men as living 
and dead, lost and saved — a stern theology, all but 
fallen into disuse. This difference between the liv- 
ing and the dead, in souls, is so unproved by casual 
observation, so impalpable in itself, so startling as a 
doctrine, that schools of culture have ridiculed or 
denied the grim distinction. Nevertheless, the grim 
distinction must be retained." 

If this be, indeed, a true account of the natural, 
unconverted man, then conversion must sweep the 
whole field, and start him, another being, into another 
realm of being. 

This author is very explicit and has the courage a* 
his faith. Let us hear him: 

''What now, let us ask, specifically distinguishes a 
Christian man from a non-Christian man? Is it that 
he has certain mental characteristics not possessed by 
the other? Is it that certain faculties have been 
trained in him, that morality assumes special and 
higher manifestations and character a nobler form? 
Is the Christian merely an ordinary man, who hap- 
pens, from birth, to have been surrounded with a 
peculiar set of ideas? Is his religion merely that 
peculiar quality of the moral life defined by Mr. 
Mathew Arnold as morality, touched by emotion? 
And does the possession of a high ideal, benevolcnc 
sympathies, a reverent spirit, and a favorable envi- 
ronment account for what men call his spiritual life?" 

To all of which he enters a negative as follows: 



THE CHRIST MISSION. ^97 

*'The distinction between them is the same as that 
between the organic and the inorganic, the Hving and 
the dead. What is the difference between a crystal 
and an organism, a stone and a plant? They have 
much in common. Both are made of the same atoms. 
Both display the same properties of matter. Both 
are subject to the physical laws. Both may be very 
beautiful. But besides possessing all that the crystal 
has, the plant possesses something more — a mysteri- 
ous something called life. This life is not something 
which existed in the crystal, only in a less developed 
form. There is nothing at all like it in the crystal. 
There is nothing like the first beginning of it in the 
crystal, not a trace or symptom of it. This plant is 
tenanted by something new, an original and unique 
possession, added over and above all the properties 
common to both. When from vegetable life we rise 
to animal life, here again we find something original 
and unique — unique at least as compared with the 
mineral. From animal life we ascend again to spirit- 
ual life. And here also is something new, something 
still more unique. He who lives the spiritual life has 
a distinct kind of life, added to all the other phases 
of life, which he manifests — a kind of life infinitely 
more distinct than is the active life of a plant from 
the inertia of a stone. The spiritual man is more dis- 
tinct in point of fact, than is the plant from the stone. 
This is the one possible comparison in nature, for 
it is the widest distinction in nature; but compared 
with the difference between the natural and the spirit- 



298 THE NEW RELIGION. 

ual, the gulx which divides the organic from the inor- 
ganic is a hair's breadth. "^ 

I have made this quotation not because I accept its 
teaching, nor for the purpose of controverting it, but 
because the author sets forth so frankly and clearly 
the nature and extent of the change necessitated by 
the Total Depravity theory. 

If the so-called natural man is endowed with spirit- 
ual potencies — with capacities which, when properly 
developed and properly directed, ally him with the 
spiritual, and make him brother to other spirits and 
all spirits — and it seems most remarkable that any can 
doubt it — then, falling into habitual sin, and building 
a bad character, as the natural man somehow is wont 
to do, he needs conversion. He is going in the wrong 
direction. He is misapplying and abusing his God- 
given powers, and must stop it. He is not dead, but 
misguided, and living beneath his privileges. He yet 
has some sense of justice, some sympathy with the 
right, the good and the true. "He has some sense of 
love and friendship, some thought of God and destiny 
— all men have. All unconverted men are not purely 
diabolical. Conversion does not sweep the whole 
field of their mental and moral powers and substitute 
something different in kind. 

A sense of justice, a sense of right and wrong, of 
friendship and love, of the good and true, are intuitions. 
To these man was born; and these ally the most 
natural man with spirit existence and qualify him for 

I. Natural Law in the Spiritual World, pp. 75 and 80., et. seq. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 299 

possible spiritual fellowship. He needs nothing dif- 
ferent in kind but a better temper and equilibrium of 
mental and moral powers to make him happy. His 
sense of justice is not diabolical, but possibly very 
crude and imperfect; it may be but germinal and 
badly overgrown with noxious vices, and so with all 
the virtues named and nameable. He needs rehabili- 
tating. He can never be the man he was intended to 
be, without it, and hence Jesus says he must be born 
again. 

As if he had said to the ruler of the synagogue, you 
have taken a wrong drift, Nicodemus. You are living 
in your lower life. The chief objects of your life are 
not what they should be. Your estimate of things 
that are in themselves perishing and unsatisfying is 
out of all proportion with their value as factors of well 
being. You must wake up to the fact that your 
higher nature is to dominate the lower, that you can- 
not live as an animal and be happy as an angel or as a 
man. Like the Prodigal, you must come to yourself 
and change your base — admitting an expressive figure 
— you must be born again. 

On the theory of total depravity all alike need con- 
version — the most innocent child as well as the most 
obdurate criminal. 

But Jesus did not hold the same language concern- 
ing children that he held to Nicodemus. 

He did not hold the language of representative 
teachers. 

Watson said they are ''judicially damned." Angus- 



300 THE NEW RELIGION. 

tine had said substantially the same, long before him. 
Luther indorsed and emphasized Augustine. The 
Protestant Episcopal church says, by implication, 
they are ^^fire-brands of hell and bond-slaves of the 
devil." But Jesus said of such is the Kingdom of 
Heaven. He must have seen that their moral condi- 
tion was very different from that of the ruler of the 
synagogue. He breathes no suspicion that theyv^ere 
or could be involved in the guilt of ^ ^original sin.*' 

And, among those recognized as fit for the Kingdom 
of Heaven, we trace a wide disparity of character and 
habits — Lazarus at the gate of Dives, the Prodigal 
Son, the good Samaritan, the penitent Publican, the 
Marys, etc. 

In short, it may be said that throughout his whole 
teaching there is no intimation of the ^^grim dogma" 
of original sin. It was only necessary that candidates 
for the franchises of the Kingdom of Heaven should 
eschew sin and love goodness. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

The Ministry of Doctrine. 

P-'ayer is the staple element of religion. It is the 
experience of conscious want appeahng to the powers 
above for help. Whether offered up by Pagan or 
Christian, 

"Prayer is the soul's sincere desire, 

Uttered or unexpressed; 
The motion of a hidden fire 
That trembles in the breast." 

It sustains the moral sense. It renders conscience 
more tenderly sensitive, it nourishes and fortifies the 
better nature, and is essential to the religious life. In 
the direst extremities it is instinctive and the final 
resort of the driven spirit. 

The Founder of the New Religion strongly empha- 
sized its importance as a privilege to be enjoyed — as a 
means to a blessing. 

In response to a request from his disciples he fur- 
nishes the following as a sample, indicating generally 
the spirit and matter of acceptable prayer: 

''Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy 
name. Thy Kingdom come. Thy Will be done on 
earth, as it is done in heaven. Give us this da}^ our daily 
bread. Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those 



302 THE- NEW RELIGION. 

who trespass against us. Lead us not into tempta- 
tion, but deliver us from evil; for thine is the King- 
dom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen." 

1. It is reverent and grateful — Hallowed be thy 
name. 

2. It is the dictate of love — Thy Kingdom — a state 
of blessing — come to all. 

3. It springs from a sense of dependence and need 
— Give us this day our daily bread. 

4. It springs from a sense of ill desert — Forgive 
us our sins. 

5. It is inconsistent with ill will — As we forgive 
others. 

6. It implies a dangerous exposure to sin — Deliver 
us from evil. 

7. It recognizes from first to last the Christian 
ideal of God. as sympathetic and merciful — ^^Our 
Father in Heaven." 

It is a marvel of brevity, propriety and comprehen- 
siveness. Nothing like it or approaching it to be 
found in any religion. 

Its spirit, and one or more of these underlying prin- 
ciples, go to make up, we may suppose, all appro- 
priate prayer. It seems perfect in every particular. 
Suited to all the dependent and needy relations of 
men. 

But certain precautions are entered up. ^^Use not 
vain repetitions." ''Don't pray to be heard of m.en." 
The heathens make a mistake, for they think they 
will be heard ''for their much speaking." And, if 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 303 

you pray to be heard of men, it were more a sacri- 
lege than an act of worship. 

As if he had said, I have given you a prayer. The 
form is not material — '^Father, I have sinned against 
heaven, and in thy sight; I am no more worthy to be 
called thy Son — make me as one of thy hired servants" 
— this will do. ^^God be merciful to me a sinner" — 
will do. *^God, I thank thee I am not as other men, 
extortioners, unjust" — stop — ^^I fast twice a week, I 
give tithes" — stop, stop — this will not do. 

Alas for human nature! There is great danger of 
falling into the sin of praying to be heard of men 

In the presence of a critical, fault-finding public, 
whether in the ^ ^temple," or at the ^ ^corners of the 
streets," it is more difficult to collect and concentrate 
one's thoughts upon one's real needs — upon God and 
duty and destiny, than in the privacy and solitude of 
the closet. It is difficult to avoid attending too much 
to the ^^form of sound words," and trimming the 
thoughts to expectant ears. In public many things 
tend to distract and to prevent that close and candid 
review of self, and that deliberation which true devo- 
tion requires. You want to avoid ^^temptation" when 
you pray, ^'Lead us not into temptation." 

A reverent recognition of the Divine Presence in a 
public meeting is always becoming and appropriate, 
and when the business is important, and especially if 
it be perplexing and difficult, it is not only proper in 
itself, but greatly needed, as it tends to withdraw the mind 



304 THE NEW RETJGION. 

from the murky regions of passion, and qualifies it for 
sober and successful action. 

But the practice of going into public for the express 
purpose of prayer and worship has no sanction in the 
New Religion. 

On the Christ theory of true worship it is difficult 
to justify the prevalent custom of repairing to public 
shrines for prayer and worship — especially difficult to 
justify the practice of hiring another to lead and con- 
duct your worship. How can another know so well 
as you yourself know what your soul needs in the way 
of God's mercy and God's blessing? Perfunctory 
prayers to be paid for, so much each, or by the dozen 
— prayers by proxy, are exceedingly liable to be 
wholly empty of power for good, mere words upon 
the air. 

If we grant that the minister, so employed, is per- 
fectly sincere and well-meaning, his sincerity and 
well-meaning cannot avail for those who employ him, 
each one of whom is responsible for himself. No offi- 
ciating priest can come between the individual soul 
and God. If he be very ignorant and feeble, the 
minister may, for the time, aid him by suggesting 
lines of thought — may possibly stimulate his devo- 
tions, but, exactly in such a case, there is imminent 
danger of the votary depending too much upon his 
priest — imminent danger of his falling into the practice 
of listening to prayer more than praying for himself. 

Every scul, however weak, is strong enough to lift 
up his prayer to God for his mercy and blessing. If 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 305 

one feels that he needs an intermediating priest, it only 
proves that he has wrong conceptions of worship, and 
it might do him good to have all such props knocked 
from under him. 

He has forgotten, if he ever knew, that God is a 
spirit, and that he who worships profitably must him- 
self worship in spirit and in truth. 

Jesus himself was not in the habit of praying in 
public. He went into the temple and synagogue, it 
is true, but it was more to teach the people than to 
pray with them or for them. Though claimed to be a 
priest (Heb. 5: 10) and initiated, as some say, into 
the priestly office, he never officiated as such, and 
never recognized the need of a priesthood as being at 
all needful or helpful to true worship. 

^^But when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and 
when thou hast shut thy door, pray to the Father 
which is in secret, and thy Father which seeth in 
secret, shall reward thee openly." In this injunction 
it is possible that he only meant to emphasize the 
necessity of one's being sincere and honest with him- 
self, and to guard against all pride and pretense of 
personal goodness, when seeking to commune with 
God. However this may be, it is a noticeable fact, 
that he did not appoint meetings for public worship, 
did not instruct his disciples to do so, and his own 
custom of withdrawing himself into solitude to pray, 
leaving even his own chosen disciples and going into 
some ^^desert place," or up into the ^ ^mountain," 
when desiring to formally commune with the Father, 



306 THE NEW RELIGION. 

though certainly there was no danger of his being 
insincere or hypocritical, accords with and reaffirms 
his instructions on the subject. 

The student of history hardly needs to be reminded 
that the priestly office has always and everywhere 
tended to abuse and usurpation. It implies and 
depends upon the practice of public and proxy wor- 
ship, which, in the very nature of things, equally 
tends to hypocrisy and corruption. The Founder of 
Christianity, as if aware of these dangerous tenden- 
cies, which, it would seem, are too strong for human 
nature, gave no sanction, either to a paid priesthood, 
or to public worship as such. 

In heathen and Pagan lands there are very many 
shrines for public worship, and the scenes there wit- 
nessed are pitiful and humiliating enough. In the 
older Catholic countries not much can be claimed in 
the way of improvement upon Pagan customs. 

Protestantism has very much improved the customs 
of public worship, though evidences of the known 
tendencies are not wanting, in certain quarters. 

The Protestant church edifice is not a mere shrine. 
It is a place where instruction is mingled with wor- 
ship. The pulpit is not simply an altar, but more a 
rostrum, and is steadily becoming more and more a 
^ ^rostrum." 

To cherish a realizing sense of the Divine Presence 
during those educational ministries is both eminently 
proper in itself, and eminently productive of good, as 
furnishing the best possible conditions for improving 



THE CHRISt MISSION. 30^ 

and exalting the whole man, and this accords with the 
teaching and practice of the Master himself. 

But prayer must be 'Hn spirit and in triUh.^'' 

At this point Christianity attains its highest eleva- 
tion as a religion. But, it is at this point, precisely, 
that it differs most from the Old Religions. Behold 
the crowds of heathen worshippers on their knees, or 
prostrate in the dust, or on weary pilgrimages, and 
in their temples ! 

Behold their priesthood, and their sacrifices ! Their 
externalism ! The Supreme Being, who cares nothing 
for them personally, can only be worshipped through 
shrines and symbols — through offered victims and 
burnt incense ! What a mockery of High Heaven, if, 
indeed, religion is an affair of the heart — if worship is 
a concern that lies between the individual soul and 
God — each for himself, as taught in the New Religion. 

*^The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in 
pain until now," the benighted creature, ^^waiting, in 
earnest expectation, the manifestation of the sons of 
God." No journey was too long, no sacrifice too great 
to be made, to bring the pilgrim worshipper, at least 
once in his life, to the sacred shrine, where he could 
bow before his God, and worship. In all lands the 
burden of religion was too intolerable to be borne. It 
was crushing out the best life of the world. 

The Founder of the Christian system, from heights 
of spiritual vision which had never been attained, 
called down to the benighted masses — '^Awake, and 
sing, ye that dwell in the dust, for thy dew is as the 



308 THE NEW RELIGION, 

dew of herbs, and the earth shaU cast out the dead.'* 
Isa. 26: ig. ^^Ye worship ye know not what. Beheve 
me, the hour cometh, and now is, when the true wor- 
shipper shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth. ' ^ 
Your sacrifices avail you nothing. Your massive 
temples and gilded altars are voiceless and dumb and 
avail 3^ou nothing. Your priests are human and sinful 
and have need to cry to God for mercy on themselves. 
They can not cancel your sins, nor bear away your 
prayers to the ear of the Most High. They can not 
return God's blessing upon your souls. Ye worship 
ye know not what. If you want the Father's blessing, 
if you want to draw near to him and ^^order your cause 
before him," ^^Enter into your closet" — leave your 
altars and officiating priests, your ritual and ceremony, 
outside, and, having shut thy door, worship God in 
spirit — ^^pray to the Father who is in secret, and the 
Father, who seeth in secret, shall reward you openly," 

How like a revelation was all this to the shell-bound 
devotees of externalism ! It summons the individual 
into the presence of God. It removes out of the way 
all external intervention and awkward machinery upon 
which the feeble votary may place a false dependence; 
it opens the sky and the sunlight to those groping their 
ways through the dark. It brings to light ^'Life and 
Immortality." 

For the early disciples, at least, the power of this 
externalism was broken. A ''Pe7itecosf^ had become 
possible. They went forth the heralds of a more 
direct, a more simple, a more spiritual and efficient 



THE CHRIST MISSION ^6g 

gospel of truth. Not a Christian church was 
built for two hundred years ; but the success and 
progress of the gospel were phenomenal, as all 
historians agree. It was the simple truth as it is in 
Jesus Christ the Son of God. It had not then been 
loaded down with doctrine and dogma. It was not 
under the espionage of an argus-eyed hierarchy, jealous 
of heresy. It had not been hedged about and built 
upon with the ritual and ceremony of an all-embracing 
ecclesiasticism, and it succeeded as it always has suc- 
ceeded and always does succeed when properly pre- 
sented. In that day Paul said, what he would yet 
say, ^^it is the power of God unto salvation." 

But if the power of externalism had been broken, 
the tendency toward it had not been destroyed. Alas ! 
So many seem incapable of any large spiritual devel- 
opment ! They feed on mere sense impressions. A 
little thinking wearies and exhausts them. They must 
call upon others for help. They constantly tend back- 
ward from the advanced position to which the great 
Teacher would bring them. For the millions of the 
Roman and Greek churches time has gone back upon 
the ^^hour" which ^^cometh and now is," when the true 
worshipper shall ^ ^worship the Father in spirit and in 
truth." They are again sunken into an all-pervading 
formalism, sickening in the proofs of its utter shallow- 
ness and superstition. 

Nor has Protestantism entirely escaped the engulf- 
ing tendency. It, too, has a surplus of doctrine and 
dogma, of symbol and ceremony. It, too, is living 



316 THE NEW RELIGION. 

too much In the letter of God's word, too little m its 
spirit and power, as a dead formalism, apparent 
throughout the Protestant world, sufficiently proves. 



CHAPTER XXX. 

The Ministry of Doctrine. 

^Tf thou bring thy gift to the altar and there remem 
berest that thy brother hath aught against thee, leave 
there thy gift, first go and be reconciled to thy brother 
and then come and offer thy gift." 

When the angels gathered together over the infant 
Jesus, and sang praises to God, they indicated the 
cause of their rejoicing — they had a prophetic vision 
of the blessed work the little mysterious stranger had 
come to accomplish. However figurative, or even 
legendar}^, this account of the evangelists may be 
thought to be, the story fairly outlines the purpose 
and life-work of the new-born world's Savior. Seven 
hundred years before the rapt Isaiah had a vision of a 
good time coming when, adopting his own strong 
metaphors, ^'the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and 
the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the calf 
and the young lion and the fatling together ; and a 
little child shall lead them ; and the cow and the bear 
shall feed together, and their young lie down together, 
and the lion shall eat straw like an ox, and the suck- 
ing child shall play upon the hole of the asp, and the 
weaned child shall put his hand on the den of the 
addci when they shall not hurt nor destroy in all my 



^12 THE NEW RELIGION. 

holy mountain, and the earth shall be full of the 
knowledge of the Lord." Isaiah ii: 6-10. 

It seems that the ^^angel and a multitude of the 
heavenly host" had discovered that the time had come 
for introducing this glorious era of peace and good 
will, and that the chief actor in this drama of reform, 
was about to take the stage. In such prophesies as 
that of Isaiah, time counts but little. According to 
our chronology, which, however, is little better than 
mere guesswork, when relating to events in that early 
age, seven hundred years transpired before Jesus 
announced that this good time — ^^the kingdom of 
heaven is at hand." 

But he had come to hasten it. And how he worked 
for it, lived for it, died for it, we learn with gratitude 
from the joint story of the four evangelists. 

Paul said, ^'If it be possible, live peaceably with all 
men. ' ' 

Many other teachers had said as much. But Jesus 
puts it stronger — very much stronger than this. 

Ye have heard that it hath been said ye shall love 
thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. But in the Chris- 
tian code there is no place for hate — absolutely none, 
except the hate one should always have, and must 
have (if he himself is good) against evil itself — against 
evil as such. I say, hate not your enemies. This old 
teaching is wrong. So far from hating, you should 
love your enemies — yes, actually love them. Should 
do good to them, pray for them, as you will be sure to 
do if you really love them. This is the way to bring 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 313 

in peace on earth and good will to men. This will 
put a stop to quarreling and bitterness — will reform 
and save men. 

But more than this. On an occasion his disciples 
say to him, '^John taught his disciples how to pray — 
Lord, teach us to pray;" and, after some prelimina- 
ries, he consents — ^^ After this manner therefore pray 
ye — ^Our Father which art in Heaven,' etc., * ^ 'forgive 
us our trespasses as we forgive them who trespass 
against us."" " This kind of praying would hardly be 
safe for some people, especially if there were any dan- 
ger of their prayer being granted. It might prove to 
be a serious thing for them, to be forgiven only as they 
forgive, because they never forgive at all. You want 
to make your peace with God — to realize that, through 
his mercy and grace, the account is square. 

Have you made your peace with men, those with 
whom you have done business, with whom you have 
had misunderstanding and clash of interests? If not, 
you cannot make your peace with God — at least, you 
cannot until you have exhausted all the resources of 
good will, in an effort to make your peace with men. 

No, you cannot. Don't bank on your general good 
character, on your honest purposes, on your church 
relations and accredited piety, none of it. Unless 
you have it in your heart to forgive them who have 
trespassed against you, whatever else you may ask, 
don't ask the Father in Heaven to forgive you. He 
will not forgive you^ at least so says the Son of Man — 
the Lord Christ. 



314 THE ISTEW RELIGION. 

''If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there remenl- 
berest that thy brother hath aught against thee" — 
then what? Ask the Heavenly Father to forgive you 
any wrong you may have done him? No. Resolve to 
do better hereafter and go on with your offering? No. 
Shut your eyes upon the past and go on with your 
offering? No. But leave there thy gift, and go, first 
be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer 
thy gift. Possibly 'twere hard to do this — humiliating. 
It may require all your moral courage, but there is no 
alternative. Leave there thy gift, be reconciled. 
There is something better for 3/ou, and more important, 
than the perfunctory services of religion. Your 
approach to the Father must begin at the point of your 
greatest distance from him. You can blink nothing. 
You must make a clean breast of it. You may not 
have much against your brother, may have nothing, 
but he has something against you. He thinks you 
have wronged him, and he is hurt, bleeding. Leave 
there thy gift. Go prove to him in some way, that at 
least you did not intend to injure him, that if you have 
done so you are sorry for it, and will make the ame?tde 
honorable. You can recover his confidence in any one 
of a hundred ways, if your heart is free to it. Leave 
there thy gift, first, be reconciled to thy brother, then 
come and offer thy gift. Why! you say this peace- 
making business seems to be a serious thing? It is. 
It is as serious and sacred as religion itself. It is 
impossible but that offences shall come. At best, we- 
are short-sighted, imperfect creatures, very liable to 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 315 

err, subject to passions that sway us to and fro, and it 
is morally certain that offences will come. They will 
come through reckless unconcern, come through strong 
temptation, come through mere inattention, come 
sometimes in spite of good intentions, but woe to him 
through whom they come. The liabilities and temp- 
tations to sin on the part of him who is offended are 
increased. The sensitive soul is pained. All heart- 
breaks bleed. But if peace and good will prevail, 
they will be less serious, and the injury inflicted will 
be mutually borne and easily expiated — when ^ ^war- 
ring passions cease their strife." Love dissolves sel- 
fishness, and throws her sheen of bliss over all the 
knots and scars of ill-directed sensibility and former 
ill will. 

In Christian thinking, peace and good will are in- 
vested with all the sanctions of religion. The favor 
of God and the hope of heaven are staked upon them. 
With enmity cherished in your heart, you dare not 
repeat the Lord's Prayer in concert at church, nor at 
the family altar, nor think it in the solitude of your 
own soul. With enmity in your heart, you dare not 
enter into your own closet and shut the door, with 
intent to pray to the Father who seeth in secret, unless 
it be to cry out with the publican, ^^God be merciful 
to me a sinner." This peacemaking business is a 
serious and important one. To go on with it properly 
you must have love for your neighbor, even for your 
enemies, if you have any. Philanthropy is the need 
of the hour and of the life. And, ''Blessed are the 



3l6 THE NEW RELIGION. 

peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of 
God/' The great All-Father cherishes an ardent love 
for every struggling child of humanity for what he is, 
or may become, on his own account, and he who ap- 
proaches him for succor and blessing, must do so 
willing to meet every brother man at the same shrine, 
and share with the same blessing. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

The Ministry of Doctrine. 

Whatever may the nature or extent of the 
change postulated by the Founder of the New 
ReHgion as necessary to the regenerate hfe of the 
sinner, the fact that it can be speedily effected under 
conditions subject to one's control is one of the most 
momentous consequence — a fact so great in its prac- 
tical possibilities as to warrant a halt in all other pro- 
cesses of reform, and demand a readjustment of 
reformatory agencies. The fact has had some recog- 
nition in Christian circles, but it has not been gener- 
ally relied on for half its value. It will help our con- 
victions on the subject to note results as they have 
appeared among men whom we know. 

The Evangelical record is brief, but we have sig- 
nificant historical outlines. It is sufficient to note 
that the twelve peasants who became the disciples of 
Jesus, during their novitiate of three years, became a 
college of religious teachers whose respective habits 
and moral characters were in the meantime, with one 
exception, greatly changed and greatly improved. 
On occasions they had manifested a disgraceful sel- 
fishness and cowardice;^ but at least from the Pente- 

I. Mark lo: 37; Luke 9: 54, Mark 14: 50. 



3l8 THE NEW RELIGION. 

cost onward they evinced a very different spirit, attest- 
ing their fidelity to the right with heroic firmness, 
even to the point of martyrdom. Luke tells us that 
^^with great power, gave the Apostles witness of the 
resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace rested 
on them all. "^ They were reborn. 

In the meantime others also had been ^ ^converted. " 
''The half of my goods," said the Chief Publican, 'T 
give to the poor, and, if I have taken anything from 
any one wrongfully, I will restore him four fold."^ 
And the Master said unto him, ''To-day is salvation 
come to this house." 

It is said that Jesus cast seven devils out of one 
Mary. Whatever this may mean, she at least ever 
afterwards appears as a most affectionate and beauti- 
ful character. And there were others of her intimate 
acquaintance and companionship who seem to have 
come into a like experience and character. 

Just how Nicodemus himself was affected we are 
not told. We notice, however, that in the face of the 
mob, and at the risk of his life, he stood for giving 
the accused, whom he thought to be a teacher come 
from God, a fair trial, and, after the crucifixion, 
doing more than any of the "disciples," he united 
with Joseph in giving the crucified Lord a respect- 
ful interment. 

The case of Peter is a clear one. How he had, on 

1. Acts 4: 3. 

2. Luke 19: 8. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 319 

various occasions, given proof of a ruling s Jfishness; 
how he, though the acknowledged chief of the disci- 
ples, yet denied his Lord with an oath, and, with the 
rest of them, forsook him and fled, is matter of 
impartial record. His moral cowardice is especially 
conspicuous and humiliating. But at last the depths 
of his selfish nature are touched by a crushing sense 
of guilt, and the vehement, worldly-minded Peter 
awakes to a new life. 

Let us hasten to note that the angry tumult had 
hardly died upon the air until Peter, facing and defy- 
ing the same murderous authorities from whom he 
had lately fled in terror, says, speaking for himself to 
John: '^We choose to obey God rather than man." 
^^The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye 
slew and hanged on a tree, to be a Prince and a Savior, 
to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins, 
and we are witnesses of these things."^ 

With what pleasure do we turn this page in the 
life of Peter and John. From this time forward Peter 
always boldly and bravely stood in the very front of 
the battle. ^^Old things were passed away.'' For 
thirty-four years, through heroic self-sacrifice, through 
persecutions and prisons, and threatened death, he 
maintained his Christian integrity, leading and honor- 
ing the cause of the New Religion, especially among 
the Jews. 

In his letter addressed to the ^ ^strangers scattered 

J, Acts 18; 39. 



320 THE NEW RELIGION. 

throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and 
Bithynia," he included himself among those who have 
been ^ ^begotten again to a lively hope of an inheritance 
incorruptible, and that fadeth not away, reserved in 
heaven; ''' * being born again, not of corruptible 
seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which 
liveth and abideth forever * called out of darkness 
into his marvelous light. "^ 

The impress of the Master's influence upon Peter's 
new life is unmistakably plain. '^What glory is it if, 
when ye — we — be buffeted for our faults we shall take 
it patiently? But if, when we do well and suffer for 
it, we take it patiently, this is acceptable with God. 
For even hereunto we are called, because Christ also 
suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should 
follow his steps, who, when he was reviled, reviled 
not again, when he suffered, threatened not, but com- 
mitted himself to him that judgeth righteously. "^ 

But Paul's experience furnishes a most striking 
illustration and proof of the possibility of a speedy 
and permanent change of character, under the Chris- 
tian regime. Behold him to-day, the merciless arch 
bigot, ^ ^breathing out threatening and slaughter," 
and going armed with authority to bring the humble 
disciples of the Lord Jesus to judgment and to death. 
But to-morrow the humble and teachable convert 
inquiring, ^^Lord, what wilt thou have me do?" 

I I Peter, Chap, i and 2. 
2, I Peter, Chap; I ^nd 2, 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 32 1 

Standing by with hard impenitence he had ''held the 
the clothes of Stephen," while the mob brutally mur- 
dered him. He had ''made havoc with the church, 
entering into every house and hailing men and women, 
committed them to prison." He had gone to the 
High Priest and "obtained letters to the Damascus 
Synagogue, that if he found any of this way, whether 
they were men or women, he m.ight bring them bound 
to Jerusalem." He was a good lawyer, a man of fine 
parts and fine scholarship. He could have succeeded 
and won place and power. He might at least have 
gone on with his business and let this bloody work 
alone. The authorities had not sought him for this 
nerve-testing business. He voluntarily took it up, 
and went forth with a zeal v/orthy of a better cause. 
We can hardly imagine a fiercer or more dispassionate 
bigot, a more deliberate perpetrator of high crimes 
against humanity. 

But after that Damascus episode, let us note that 
Saul was a very different kind of man. He writes to 
the Romans: "Let us not judge one another any 
more! Let every one be fully persuaded in his own 
mind!" Saul of Tarsus, what has haj)pened! What 
is it you say? ''Let us ?iot Judge 07ie another any 
inorey "Why dost thou set at naught thy brother?" 
"We shall all stand before the judgment seat of 
Christ." 

And this is Saul! ^'If eating meat make my brother 
to offend, I will eat no more meat while the world 
stands," You are very considerate, Saul — very ten- 



322 THE NEW RELIGION. 

der and kind to your brother — very different, it seems, 
from what you were before that Damascus ride 
What has happened? ^^Old things are passed away, 
behold all things are become new." Saul, the obdu- 
rate persecutor, has emerged into a new world. 

Henceforth, with all his great powers, he was sim- 
ple-hearted, child-like, transparent. His transforma- 
tion is complete. His intolerance and bigotry are 
gone. His hardness of heart and want of sympathy 
are gone. The spirit of persecution is gone. The cur- 
rent of life's forces sets in another direction. The 
Lord Jesus Christ has come to be all in all. If he 
had been narrow and selfish, his narrowness and sel- 
fishness had gone. After that voice and that light on 
his way to Damascus, and his interview with Ananias 
in the house of Judas, he buries himself in the Arabian 
desert for three years. Why? We are not told, but 
probably to commune more at length with God in 
prayer and meditation, to obtain the clearest possible 
understanding of what he should do, and to prepare 
himself for the responsible work which now was open- 
ing up before him. He '^conferred not with flesh and 
blood," he tells us, but yielding to the divine call, he 
went forth a chosen vessel to bear the name of the 
Lord to the Gentiles, to kings, and to the children of 
Israel.^ 

How heroically and successfully he fulfilled his high 
commission, and how faithfully and closely he fol- 

j, Actg9: 15. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 323 

lowed the great Exemplar and honored his cause is 
matter of delightful history. He was ^ ^converted." 

Other cases could be given by the hundred and the 
thousand — apposite, beautiful! — some of them about 
as striking and decisive as that of Paul, and to the 
same effect; so fully does experience explain and 
enforce the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ on the 
subject. 

Justin Martyr, living half a century after Paul, says: 
''We who formerly delighted in fornication now strive 
for purity. We who used magical arts have dedi- 
cated ourselves to the good and eternal God. We 
who loved the acquisition of wealth more than all else 
now bring what we have into the common stock and 
give to every one in need. We who hailed and 
destroyed one another, now live familiarly with each 
other. We pray for our enemies; we endeavor to 
persuade those who hate us unjustly to live conforma- 
bly to the beautiful precepts of Christ, to the end they 
may become partakers with us of the same joyful 
hope."^ 

When fifty years later the Christians of Bithynia 
were brought before the tribunal of the younger Pliny, 
they assured the Pro- Consul, that far from being 
engaged in any unlawful conspiracy, they were bound 
by a solemn obligation to abstain from the commis- 
sion of those crimes which disturb the public peace 
of society — from theft, robbery and fraud. * * ''The 

I. Conflict of Chris. Heathenism, p. 166. 



324 THE NEW RELIGION. 

friends of Christianity," says Pliny, ^^may acknowl- 
edge without a blush that many of the most eminent 
saints had been, before their baptism (conversion), 
among the most abandoned." 

Nor was the transforming power of the Christian 
Gospel limited to the early ages of the church, nor to 
tlie respectable circles of society. 

The Lord Jesus gave large attention to the poorest 
and most degraded classes. So conspicuously true is 
this that some have thought that the Christ mission to 
this world was only to the poor. But such a view 
surely is quite too narrow and inadequate. He did, 
however, have hope of them — carried them most of 
all on his heart. 

The Christianity of the times seems to be drifting 
toward the wealthy and pseudo ^ ^better classes." 
The down-town churches are getting away from the 
crowded marts out upon ^'avenues" and ^ ^boulevards," 
and away from the ragged masses. Fine churches 
are built by the wealthy, and for the wealthy, and 
comparatively few of the more degraded classes ever 
get into them, or hear the gospel anywhere. They 
seldom see anything distinctly Christian, and the con- 
viction seems to prevail that they are so sin-hardened 
and debased as to be practically out of the reach of 
the gospel. The very classes of people which 
appealed most strongly to the sympathy and the help 
of the Master are the most neglected. But, as in the 
days of the Son of Man, so in these days, the power 
of the gospel to save men from sin is often strikingly 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 325 

and beautifully illustrated by the conversion of some 
of the worst characters. With the hope of awaken- 
ing increased interest in the unfortunate victims of 
ignorance and crime, who yet constitute so large a 
per cent, of the population, I give the following cases 
illustrating the specifically Christian modus operandi 
and its results. It seems to me that Christians them- 
selves need to be again reminded of the powers and 
possibilities of the Christian gospel. 

The following quotation from Rev. Irenaeus Prime, 
D. D., will explain itself: ^ ^Returning home after 
my summer recess in 1884, I had not been in my 
house five minutes when a gentleman called to ask me 
to conduct the funeral of Jerry McAuley. Is he dead? 
I asked in a burst of mingled surprise and emotion 
* * * The next day was the Sabbath. The funeral 
was to be in the afternoon. As the hour approached, 
and indeed all day, my thoughts had been dwelling 
on the fact that New York had no consciousness of 
the loss it had met. * * * Very few knew or 
cared for Jerry McAuley. We are going to the 
Broadway Tabernacle to talk of what he was and 
what he had done, to a little congregation that will 
gather there; if it were Dr. Taylor, the beloved and 
honored pastor, the house would be crowded, and the 
mourners would go about the streets, but poor Jerry, 
he is dead, and who will be there to weep over his 
remains! Ah, how little did I know the place he 
filled in the heart of this great city. * * * 

^^As I turned down Fifth avenue, through Thirty- 



326 THE NEW RELIGION. 

fourth street, I saw a vast multitude standing in the 
sunshine, filhng the streets and the square in front of 
the Tabernacle. Astonished at the spectacle, and 
wondering why they did not go in and take seats in 
the church, I soon found that the church was packed 
with people. * * * * * 

'^And then eloquent lips spoke of him, and the 
great good done by him in fields of labor uninviting 
and often repelling those who care for the souls of the 
perishing among us. It was said that no one pastor in 
New York is doing the work of this humble man — no 
pastor who will leave a wider vacancy when he falls, 
on the high-places in the field of duty.*'^ 

Jerry McAuley was a river-thief and criminal 
rough, convicted and sent to the penitentiary at Sing- 
Sing, in the state of New York, some years ago. 

*^I was only nineteen years of age," he says, '^when 
arrested for highway robbery — a child in years, but a 
man in sin. I had spent my time in the vile dens 
of Water street. New York, practicing all sorts of 
wickedness. Here I learned to be a prize-fighter, 
and, by rapid degrees, rose through all the grades of 
vice and crime till I became a terror and a nuisance 
in the Fourth Ward. 

*^I had no friends, no advocate at court, and, with- 
out just cause, I was sentenced to fifteen years in the 
state prison. I burned with vengeance, but what could. 
I do? I was handcuffed and sent in the cars to Sing- 
Sing^; 

I. Introduc. Life and works Jerry McAuley. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 327 

This sufficiently indicates his character and position 
in life. Let us follow him as he approaches the crisis 
of reform. He continues: 

^^When I had been in the prison four years, one 
Sunday morning I went with the rest to service in the 
chapel. 

^'I was moody and miserable. As I took my seat I 
raised my eyes carelessly to the platform, and who 
should I see there but a man named Orville Gardner, 
who had been for years a confederate in sin — ^ Awful 
Gardner' was the name by which I had always known 
him. Since my imprisonment he had been converted 
and was filled with a desire to visit the prison that he 
might tell the glad story to the prisoners. I had not 
heard of his coming, and could not have been more 
surprised if an angel had come down from heaven. * * 
After the first look I began to question in my own mind 
if it was he after all, and I thought I must be mis- 
taken. But the moment he spoke I was sure, and 
my attention was held fast. 

^^He said he did not feel that he belonged on the 
platform, where ministers and good men stand to 
preach the gospel to prisoners — that he was not worthy 
of such a place; so he came down and stood in front of 
the desk, that he might be among them. He told them 
that it was only a little while since he had taken off 
the stripes which they were then wearing, and while he 
was talking the tears fairly rained down out of his eyes. 
When he kneeled down and prayed and sobbed and 
cried, I do not believe there was a dry eye in the 



328 THE NEW RELIGION. 

whole crowd. Tears filled my eyes, and I raised my 
hand slowly to wipe them off, for I was ashamed to 
have my companions or the guards see me weep. * I 
knew this man was no hypocrite. We had been asso- 
ciated in many a dark deed and sinful pleasure. I 
had heard oaths and curses and vile angry words 
from his mouth, and I knew he could not talk as he 
did unless some great change had come to him. I 
devoured every word that fell from his lips. * "^ 

^^I went back to my cell and what I heard was ring- 
ing in my ears." 

Time passes, but he could not forget his old-time 
friend. He says: ^T was resting one night from 
walking up and down and thinking what a change 
religion had made on Gardner, when I began to 
have a burning desire to have the same. I could not 
get rid of it, but what could I do?" 

Retried to pray, but could not ^^form a prayer." 
Remembered the publican's prayer, but was ashamed 
to say it. A great struggle ensued. ^ 'Every sin," 
he says, ^'stared me in the face. T am so wicked,' I 
thought — everything but a murderer, and that many 
a time in my will." A crushing sense of sin rested 
upon him for some weeks. ''But at last," he says, 
"the Lord sent a softness and tenderness into my 
soul, and I shed many tears. Then I began to read 
the bible on my knees. The Sunday services seemed 
to do me no good. They were dead to me. 

"About this time Miss D. began to visit the 
prison, and I was sent for one day to meet her in the 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 329 

library. She talked with me, and then knelt down to 
pray. I felt ashamed, but I knelt beside her. 1 
looked through my fingers and watched her. I saw 
her tears fall. An awe I cannot describe fell on 
me. It seemed dreadful to me — the prayer of that 
holy woman. It made my sins rise up till they 
looked to me as if they rose clear up to the throne of 
God. * What should I do? O what can a poor 
sinner do when there is nothing between him and 
God but a life of dark and terrible sin?" 

He closes this tragic account as follows: 

^^That night I fell on my knees on the hard stone 
floor of my cell, resolved to stay there, whatever 
might happen, until I found forgiveness. I was 
desperate. >h ^ic * h^ 

'^I prayed and stopped, prayed again and stopped, 
my knees were rooted to those cold stones. * I was 
determined to stay till morning, till I was called to 
work. And then, I said to myself, if I did not get 
relief, I will never pray again. I felt that I might 
die, but didn't care for that. 

'^All at once it seemed as if something supernatural 
was in my room. I was afraid to open my eyes. I 
was in an agony, and the sweat rolled off from my 
face in great drops. O how I longed for God's mercy! 
Just then, in the very height of my distress, it seemed 
as if a hand was laid upon my head, and these words 
came to me: *My son, thy sins, which are many, are 
forgiven. ' I do not know if I heard a voice, yet the 
words were distinctly spoken to my soul. O the 



330 THE NEW RELIGION. 

precious Christ! * What a thrill went through me! 
I jumped from my knees; I paced up and down my 
cell. A heavenly light seemed to fill it. * I did not 
know whether I was living or not. I clasped my 
hands and shouted — Praise God, praise God." 

We have now to note that Mr. McAuley was in due 
time released from prison on a governor's pardon, 
and, after tripping a few times, through the force of 
old associations and bad habits, he finally became an 
exemplary Christian and a very useful man. 

He founded two successful missions and a religious 
journal in New York, and for sixteen 3^ears he labored 
among the most abandoned classes of the great city, 
with the most signal and gratifying success, being 
instrumental in the reformation of hundreds of notori- 
ous criminals. He was born of the Spirit. 

Mr. McAuley gives the following account of one of 
the converts at his mission: ^'A professional gam- 
bler, William Fitz Morris, * was converted. He gave 
some fearful descriptions of his terrible business, and 
the scenes he had witnessed while engaged in it. He 
told how men of families would come in and stake, 
little by little, their earnings until every cent was 
gone; then, fascinated by the game, they would strip 
off their clothing, piece by piece, until the}'^ could go 
no further. He told of young girls sent by their 
mothers to buy * 'policy slips" for them — sent into 
these hell-holes, amid the cursing and obscenity of 
the lowest there, by their own mothers, until, step by 
step, they began to be crazed over the game and 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 33I . 

would buy for themselves * * and in the end sell 
themselves to get money to gamble with. His reve- 
lations were published in the daily papers, and his 
old associates became so enraged they threatened to 
kill him. We kept him and protected him from their 
fury. His health continued to fail, and we expected 
soon to have the task of laying him in his grave. He 
did not fear death, but continued strong in his faith 
and clear in the assurance of his acceptance with God 
through Jesus Christ. *' 

The following case is given because it illustrates, 
on the one hand, the possible depths of human 
depravity, and on the other, the possibilities of reform, 
by methods peculiarly Christian: 

^^There was a certain man called ^Rowdy Brown,' 
a great, powerfully-built, courageous fellow, who was 
a terror to the Fourth Ward. He had been a mate 
on the Liverpool packets, and was a savage brute. 
Once he happened to see a man sitting on the fore- 
castle reading his bible, and, without a word or sign 
of provocation. Brown drew back his heavy boot and 
kicked the poor fellow square in the mouth, knocking 
his teeth out and disfiguring him cruelly. * * * 
He seemed utterly fearless of consequence to himself, 
as he proved one day by standing and cursing a man 
to his face, who stood with a revolver in each hand, 
and fired their contents into his body. He was 
charged with several murders and other heinous 
crimes. * It happened that one of his sailor chums 
bad been converted^ and wa3 attending the meetings. 



332 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Brown was mad when he heard of it. Swearing a 
great oath, he said, ^I will take a bottle of whisky 
down there, and when that fellow gets up to talk I will 
take him *" * tear his mouth open, and pour the 
whisky down him, or break his back in the attempt.' 
He came round with his bottle and waited for his old 
companion to testify in order to carry out his plan. 
While waiting he listened to others, and listening 
he became interested, until all of a sudden he felt 
a strong feeling come over him, and he began to 
tremble. He fought it off with all his natural obsti- 
nacy, but it was of no use — it continued to grow 
stronger, and when his friend rose to testify this 
human lion was as tame as a lamb. When the testi- 
monies were ended, and sinners were invited to come 
forward. Brown stood up and cried out, ^O pray for 
me.' Everything was in a state of quiet, but intense 
excitement for a moment, for many present knew his 
desperate character. How he cried for mercy! It 
was awful to hear that man groan and beg. His 
strong body was racked with the anguish of his soul. 
He continued seeking in this manner, until the meet- 
ing closed, but apparently without encouragement. 
On the second night, after getting into bed, he was 
praying earnestly, when suddenly the light broke into 
his heart." 

For the rest of his story let it suffice to say that he 
lived a consistent Christian life, was active in helping 
the mission, and died believing that God, .for Christ's 
sake, bad pardoned all his great sipis, 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 333 

The following touching story is so beautiful and so 
illustrates the Christian method of reform and its 
power to reach and to save even the most degraded, I 
shall be pardoned for quoting it somewhat at length: 

^^One night a beautiful little child about five years 
old came to the door. She was a lovely little thing, 
with bright blue eyes and long golden curls — a perfect 
little picture, notwithstanding the poor care she had 
received. She turned to the m.an at the door and 
asked, 'Say mister, wont you please let me in? PI] 
be good if you will.' 'Oh no,' he said looking 
down at the little waif. 'You couidn t behave.' 
'Yes I will, I'll be awful good. 'Caus' I want to 
hear the singing. ' He yielded to her entreaties, and 
she went in, and folding her little hands on her lap, sat 
as quiet as a mouse until the meeting closed. The 
next evening she came again leading by the hand 
another little girl, younger than herself, but looking very 
much like her. She again asked permission to go in, 
and having referred to her good behavior the previous 
night, it was granted. They walked deliberately up 
to the front seat, and, lifting her little sister well up on 
the bench, Mollie sat down beside her, and closely 
watched everything that was said or done. They 
behaved beautifully and at the close of the meeting 
my wife kissed them both, and gave them a chunk of 
cake each, and they ran out happy enough. 

"This happened several nights and they always got 
their kiss and cake. 

^^Qm night during th^ meeting, the mother of the 



334 ^^^ ^^^ RELIGION. 

little girls came to the door of the church and asked 
if the children were there. The man replied, he 
thought they were; when she said, ^I'll be thankful to 
ye mister, if you will go in and kick them two chil- 
dren out.' ^We don't do things that way here,' said 
the man; when she called ^Mollie, Mollie Rollins, 
come out here/ Poor little Mollie turned pale, and 
trembled, and looked at me with such a frightened 
look, like a scared bird. The mother screamed out 
her name again and added, T'll give it to you going in 
there with those black Protestants, you little wretch,' 
and as poor Mollie came out dragging her little sister 
after her, the drunken mother caught her by the 
beautiful curly hair, and flung her clear off the 
ground. ^PU kill you, if you go in there again; and, 
do they give you any beer in there? Say?' 

^^The poor little thing looked up, though the tears 
were in her eyes, and said, 'O mamma, aint you awful! 
They don't drink any beer in there, and they don't 
get drunk neither.' 

*^The next night just as service commenced, in 
walked Mollie and Jennie again. *Aint you afraid 
your mother will kill you.' -^Oh no,' she answered 
quickly, as she turned her blue e^es up to my face, 
^I aint afraid. I like the singing.' 

^'Everybody around the mission .oved those dar- 
lings, and was pleased to have them there. We 
missed them for two or three evenings, and afterwards 
learned the father had returned from a sea-voyage. 
The husband and wife both went on a terrible spree. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 335 

with the money he brought, until finally he brutally 
turned the mother and little ones out of the house, 
into the cold October night air. That night Mrs. 
McAuley heard her name called; she listened a 
moment, and recognized Mollie's voice calling from 
the street, ^Mrs. McAuley, O Mrs. McAuley, come 
down, I want to tell you something.' After a minute 
the little voice rang out again, ^Mrs. McAuley, O 
Mrs. McAuley.' On going down, my wife learned 
that the father had put them out, and they had been 
on the roof. As the wind blew cold the little one said 
to her mother, ^Mamma, I know a place where the 
wind wont blow, and where we wont be afraid.' 
^Where's that?' asked her mother. ^Over in the mis- 
sion,' said the child. My wife came up stairs saying 
to me, ^Mrs. Rollins is there with her children. I 
have let them in. I believe it may be the salvation 
of that woman' s soul. ' We took them up stairs, where 
we had the only accommodation the old mission house 
afforded. It was a rickety affair, but it was the best 
we could do. There was a straw tick, and a few old 
quilts, and as they turned in Mollie looks up to her 
mother and says ^thank God mother, we have a good 
bed to night.' 

^^In the morning we gave them their breakfast — 
the same as we had ourselves, and sat with them at 
table. We never mentioned anything to the mother 
about her conduct, but treated them kindly, and, after 
breakfast, they left. 

<'This was the first step toward reaching that poor 



336 THE NEW RELIGION. 

woman, and it turned out that the little acts of kind- 
ness were not lost. 

''The man, having spent his money, went off to sea 
again, but left the family his advance money, and this 
was the mother's opportunity for another big spree, 
and she made the most of it. She spread it every- 
where, and soon the money was gone. But rum must 
be had, and one thing after another went to the pawn- 
shop, till there was nothing left that would bring a 
penny. The poor children were dirty and unwashed, 
and their hair was all matted and tangled, and they 
looked fearful. They came in one day, their lips blue 
with cold. My wife warmed them, combed out their 
hair, and curled it beautifully over their foreheads. 
She then begged two little dresses from a friend, who 
had some small girls; the dresses were somewhat 
worn, but were neat and clean, and the dear little 
things were happy as larks. When they went over 
where their mother was drinking she hardly recog- 
nized them. 'Oh,' said she, 'what happened to you? 
Who did that?' The rumseller's wife remarked, 
'Why, Vd never known them!' 'Nor I,' said the 
mother. 'I hardly knew them myself. Well, you 
look good anyhow.' 

"This was the second blow at that hard heart. 

"Shortly after this the long spree began to tell on 
Mrs. Rollins, and she was taken sick; and after suffer- 
ing awhile she sent Mollie over after my wife; this being 
the first move toward us she had ever made, we hailed 
it with joy. My wife went as requested, accompanied 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 337 

by a friend, and oh, what a miserable sight there met 
their eyes! The room was robbed of everything mova- 
ble but the remains of a bed; fragments of dirty 
dishes scattered all around the dirty floor, the room 
cheerless, fireless, comfortless. They found her 
stretched with the horrors (delirium tremens), and 
without saying much to her straightened up the room, 
made a fire after getting some coal, and then the 
friend went home and brought over a pitcher full of 
good, strong hot tea, told her to drink it, which she 
did in a hurry. This helped her somewhat and they 
talked to her about her condition and prayed with her. 

^^These acts of kindness were the hardest blows of 
all to her prejudices, and she broke down and said, 
*If ever I get well of this spell I'm going to come 
over, Mrs. McAuley, and see you at the mission.' 
She got well, and one night she came into the mis- 
sion during the meeting. We were singing. The 
stone rolled away, when she screamed right out, and 
starting from her seat, ran through the kitchen think- 
ing to get out that way. My wife followed quickly, 
caught her, and then kneeling down prayed earnestly 
with the poor sobbing creature. She found the Lord's 
help, and he so sweetly saved ner, that it was appar- 
ent to all. ' ' 

The rest of the story relates: how she was not 
ashamed of her religion; how she was persecuted b}^ 
her Roman Catholic associates; how she fell sick with 
consumption, and grew worse; how she loved those 
who had been instrumental in redeeming her from a 



338 THE NEW RELIGION. 

life of sin and shame, and how, at last she sweetly 
rested in the love of God and died. She was ^^con- 
verted." 

A case is given of a man fifty-four years of age who 
had spent more than half his life in English and 
American prisons. His parents were thieves before 
him. When eight years old he was in prison with his 
mother and his aunt. He had been transported to 
Van Dieman's land for seven years, was sent to 
Australia for ten years, and to Gibralter for five 
years — had been in a solitary cell for three years, 
without being permitted to pass out of it. His back 
cut into gashes testified to the punishment he had 
suffered for disobedience. He said of himself, that^ 
coming out of prison, he tried to quit stealing, but 
yet he continued to steal, had ^ ^stealing on the 
brain.'' 

But he was converted. He makes this state- 
ment: 

^^When I came into this mission on the i8th day of 
March, 1878, I vvas just down from ^Sing-Sing,' 
where I had been four years. But God has taken the 
desire for stealing out of my heart, and put a better 
desire there. I have not had a thought to steal since. 
I am trying to serve God now. I ask an interest in 
your prayers. McAuley's Life and Work, p. 202. 

These cases must suffice, though I find it difficult to 
refrain from giving others, so beautifully do they 
illustrate and corroborate the peculiarly Christian 
spirit and modus operandi of saving men from sin. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 33^ 

Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith 
the Lord. 

Stronger than death or hell, 

The sacred power we prove, 
And, conquerors of the world, we dwell 

In heaven, who dwell in love." 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

The Ministry of Doctrine. 

The Jews lived in expectation of a great deliverer. 
The old theocracy had passed away. Their kings 
were dead, and they had passed under the Roman 
yoke. 

But their prophets had assured them that a better 
destiny awaited the descendants of Jacob. 

^^Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. 
The government shall be upon his shoulders. * * 
of his increase there shall be no end.*'^ 

^Tn the days of those kings the God of Heaven 
shall set up a kingdom, which shall never be 
destroyed. * * His kingdom is an everlasting 
kingdom, and his dominion from generation to 
generation."^ 

This was the impassioned language of prophet and 
seer, which led the Jews to hope for an empire, of 
which the Old Theocracy was but a suggestion. 

Answering to this expectation Jesus announces him- 
self as the child of prophesy — or, at least, accepts 

1. Isa. 9: 6. 

2, Dan. 4: 3. 



tttE CHRIST MISSION, 341* 

such announcement as true, and assured them that 
the long-expected kingdom is at hand. 

But he was a great disappointment to them. They 
had utterly failed to comprehend their own prophet?^. 
They were living in the letter, their prophets had 
written in the spirit. 

Jesus sought in every way to lift them out of their 
materialistic conceptions, but it seemed impossible. 
They expected to enter the promised kingdom by 
force of arms, and with the glory of conquest, and 
they saw nothing in the humble Nazarene that gave 
them hope. He was poor, and without rank or pres- 
tige. Besides, he did not fall in with their views, or 
enter into their hopes. And then they could not, or 
at least did not, understand him. 

Remaining habitually down among the poor and 
obscure, he yet exhibited singular wisdom, and made 
most extraordinary claims to authority and high kin- 
ship with God. 

The Jewish authorities could not, for a moment, 
believe that he was the promised ^'Messiah.'* 

And he was himself keenly alive to the danger of 
being set down as an imposter, if not as a stark luna- 
tic. Nothing could save him from such a judgment 
but a life as unique and extraordinary as were his pre- 
tensions. His life must be a constant sanction and 
proof of his high claims. It must withstand the 
ordeal of merciless criticism. It must secure him 
against prejudice and bigotry, and protect him against 
the disgrace arising from his associations. 



342 THE NEW RELIGION. 

As a matter of fact, the Lord Jesus found it exceed- 
ingly difficult to make men believe that he was indeed 
the Christ 

And yet this, precisely, was what he must Ao, oefore 
he could more than imperfectly begin his work proper. 

Accordingly he improved every opportunity, and 
spared no pains to impress this fact upon men, and to 
build up their faith in him as such. 

How he wrought miracles, lived a life of spotless 
purity, manifested the divine power and the divine 
love — how he opened up the way to life and immor- 
tality, was crucified, raised from the dead, and in the 
end was translated to heaven, are the more remarka- 
ble incidents in his wonderful life, as given by his four 
biographers, and repeated and confirmed by Paul and 
others — all this is familiar to all conversant with these 
scriptures; — a series of events certainly quite as 
unique and remarkable as were his claims to the 
Messiahship. 

To further his purposes he chose twelve men who 
became his disciples. 

These he instructed in detail, and, by dint of repe- 
tition, and fuller illustration, he sought to bring them 
up to some adequate conception of his true character 
and mission 

But they seemed dull of understanding — often, 
mdeed, gave sad proof of it. However, he made 
some things plain, and won more and more upon 
their faith and confidence. 

He appealed to the scriptures, and bid the incredu- 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 343 

lous Jews to search the scriptures, to note what had 
been written concerning him by Moses and by the 
Prophets, and in the Psalms. 

And, last of all, he appealed to his works — ^'If I do 
not the works of the Father, believe me not, but if I 
do, believe me for the work's sake." 

But the current set heavily against mm; tne Sanhe- 
drim, the Scribe, the Pharisee — the whole hierarchy, 
were yet against him. 

It was not until late in his ministry that he thought 
it worth while to ask even his disciples, ^^Whom do 
men say that I am?" They had had much better oppor- 
tunities than the public generally, and it was to be 
presumed that, if others had failed to comprehend 
him, they, at least, had done so. ^^Whom do men 
say that I am?" ^'Some say thou art John the Bap- 
tist, some say Elias, others Jeremias, or one of the 
Prophets." Matt. i6: 14. After all that he had done 
to break his mission to the world, it seemed no one 
had understood him. But ^'Whom say ye that I 
am?" Peter replied, ^^We believe that thou art what 
thou hast claimed to be, the Christ, the Son of the 
living God." At last the disciples had caue^ht a 
glimpse of his true character, and Peter, first of all 
men, voiced the faith upon which he could proceed to 
build his future work. 

It is not to be supposed that his disciples more 
than half comprehended their reply, for it is certain 
that they yet expected he would some day assume 
the reins of political power, and ^ ^restore the kingdom 



344 I'HE NEW RELIGION. 

to Israel." It is certain that, soon afterward, when 
they saw their Master in the toils, they all ^'forsook 
him and fled." But he had made an impression. 
He had at least caused them to formulate the truth, 
in their own words, and committed them to it. He 
had gained a point, and was evidently pleased to 
think that so much had been accomplished; and he 
replied: ^^Blessed art thou, Simon, son of Jonas. 
Flesh and blood have not revealed this to thee, but 
my Father in Heaven." 

He experienced a like satisfaction when the woman 
in faith touched the hem of his garment, and again 
when the centurion applied to him with such confi- 
dence on behalf of his sick daughter. The truth was 
actually getting out. 

However, even after the drama of his world-life had 
closed, there were yet but few who were convinced 
that he was, indeed, the promised Messiah, and fewer 
still who had any fair conception of his true character 
and mission, — so difficult was it to inaugurate the 
New Religion. 

It is evident that, before he could fairly begin his 
work proper, he must succeed in revealing himself. 
Faith in himself, in the very nature of the case, must 
constitute the base of his superstructure — the ^^rock" 
Upon which he must build, as he intimated to the dis- 
ciples, and this accounts for his evident solicitude 
and purpose to make himself known in his true char- 
acter, both before and after his resurrection. **I 
came out from the Father and am come into the world. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 345 

Again I leave the world and go to the Father — Ye 
believe in God, believe also in me." 

Here then there is for the Christian a quid creden- 
dum — something to be assented to, to be believed— 
Jesus is the Christ of God, the world's Messiah. 

But Christian faith in its fullness means more. 

And now we have to note that Jesus, at last 
revealed and understood in his true character as the 
Christ, proposed to establish friendly and most 
intimate relations between himself and the world of 
mankind — such relations as would infallibly secure to 
men the development of spiritual capacity and power 
otherwise unattainable. 

He was always easily accessible, did not repulse 
the most timid and consciously unworthy. He 
explained at length, and often, how congeniality and 
reciprocity could be established between himself and 
those who would accept him. But one thing hin- 
dered — indeed, it stood squarely in the way. Good 
and evil are incompatible. Between virtue and vice 
there is a ^^great gulf fixed." 

If one has been doing wrong, fostering vice, he 
must stop it. He must eschew evil and cleave to 
that which is good. A sense of conscious guilt dis- 
qualifies the impenitent guilty for society with the 
good and pure. In the very nature of things it can- 
not be otherwise. 

But Jesus calls upon sinners to repent and turn 
from wrong doing, and assures them that congeniality 
and reciprocity with himself are yet possible. 



346 THE NEW RELIGION. 

He gives indubitable proof of his love for men — 
even for the lowest and meanest. He exhorts men to 
accept his overtures — to make common cause with 
him, and share his blessing. He says ^Comeuntome 
all ye that are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 
As to all that concerns your life and happiness, I and 
my Father are one. Whom I love the Father loves. 
He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.'' I rep- 
resent the Father. What I say to you I say not of 
myself, but the Father speaks to you through me. 
Come unto me, then; congenial and reciprocal with 
me, you are so with the Father. 

As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you 
— abide ye in my love. 

But Lord, thou art pure and holy and good — can 
this scarred life of mine become in kind like thine? 
You can hardly attain to that complete identification 
with the Father and fullness of blessing which I 
enjoy, hardly feel the strong pulses of love that throb 
in my breast, hardly realize the heaven of peace and 
satisfaction that reign in my experience. You have 
been touched and damaged by sin, as I have not. 
Your sky is overclouded, your spiritual faculties 
blunted, but come unto me and you shall find that 
sin has not destroyed your capacity for heaven and 
happiness. I am the vine, ye are the branches. The 
life that courses in the vine courses in the branches — 
the same in kind — abide in me. Though scarred and 
damaged by sin, you are not destroyed. Congeniality 
and reciprocity with me and with the Father in 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 347 

Heaven are yet possible. Doubt it not. Created in 
the image of God, you were born for such congeniality 
and reciprocity^ and, lifted out of sin, you are quali- 
fied for fellowship with the Son and with the Father. 

^^I indeed baptize you with water," said John, 
*^but one cometh after me mightier than I * he 
will baptize you with the Spirit and with fire." What 
are some of the conditions under which this baptism 
of Spirit and fire takes place, have been noted in 
former pages. Converted — born from above, you 
enter into the kingdom of heaven, — you come into 
congeniality and rapport with the Lord Jesus Christ — 
you share his life and his joy. These things have I 
spoken unto you that my joy might remain in you, 
and that your joy might be full. 

We note these two principal elements of Christian 
faith — a belief — a quid credendum and a ^^trust" — a 
quid fidendufji. The former is historical — objective, 
the latter experimental — subjective. 

It is the latter which Paul defines as the assurance 
of things hoped for — the conviction of things not 
seen. It is this, which, in its subjective results, at 
least, yield the richest possible fruitage of the Chris- 
tian's life — the ^^joy unspeakable and full of glory." 

According to his biographers, faith was the secret of 
a great power in the hands of Jesus, and he assured 
his disciples that it would be th^ condition of a like 
power in their hands. 

We know that confidence in results is generally 
necessary to success. Mutual undoubting confidence 



34^ THE NEW RELIGION. 

makes beautiful homes, good neighbors, good 
society. It inspires friendship and love. But for 
mutual trust and confidence — faith in our fellows — in 
the powers that be around and above us, — we could 
not live. 

Supreme faith seems to make men next to omnipo- 
tent. 

'^Give a man faith and though his heart be narrow, 
and his brain confined, and what he believes, an 
absurdity, and a dream, he will pass by hundreds of 
other men who occasionally doubt, and tramping 
them in their gore, will control a fiery nation, and 
reign in terror, till the name of Robespierre is a 
trembling, and an abhorrence over the earth.'' ^^Give 
a people faith, and though its tribes be scattered and 
powerless over its desert domain, like the dismem- 
bered limbs of a giant, it will gather itself together, 
and stride forth along the quaking earth, till every 
nation trembles at the name of Islam. "^ 

It is not, however, my purpose to explain, or to 
attempt to explain, the relation of faith to powder, 
though there can be no doubt, that human failures are 
to be traced more frequently to lack of faith, than to 
lack of possibility. If faith, working by misguided 
passion in Alexander, could conquer the world as he 
did, what shall it not achieve, when working by 
love and directed by wisdom? 

In the tropical language of the East, Jesus assured 

I. Peter Bayne, in Christian Life, p. 44. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 349 

his disciples, that, if they had ^^faith as a grain of 
mustard seed, they should say to this mountain, 
remove hence to yonder plain, and it shall remove 
and nothing shall be impossible to you." Matt. 
17: 20. 

This of course is hyperbole, but its teaching can 
hardly be misunderstood. 

He himself did many wonderful things, which were 
called ^ ^miracles," but he said in connection, ^^The 
works that I do, shall ye do, and even greater works 
than these, because I go to the Father." 

My opportunities shall cease, while yours will 
remain. 

The subjective effects of faith are not less remark- 
able and astounding than the objective. They are 
seen in trance, in hallucination, in ecstacy, in clair- 
voyance, in rapture, in the entheasm of the poet, and 
the charisms of the seer, as well as in the exaltation 
attained in the higher Christian experience. 

That some of these affections depend upon physi- 
ological conditions, can hardly be doubted, but the 
psychological phenomena probably arise none the 
less according to law. Fixed attention upon an object, 
ideal or real, and faith in it — that is, implicit reliance 
upon the occurrence of the expected, or desired result, 
—a conviction that it must be so, is sometimes fol- 
lowed by wonderful results, as the necromancers and 
mesmerists have proven. But, however inexplicable, 
we may not doubt that Imv reigns within the sphere of 



350 THE NEW RELIGION. 

the psychical^ as we know it reigns within the sphere of 
the physical. 

If we grant that the wonderful Son of Man under- 
stood the laws of mind better than the philosophers, 
and who now doubts this? we should not be sur- 
prised that he should be able to achieve results that 
seem altogether extraordinary and miraculous. 

But what is of most import to us, frail mortals that 
we are, is to know God the Father, and the Son whom 
he hath sent, to realize the divine presence in our 
experience to the extent of our capacity, — to enjoy all 
possible intimacy and companionship with the Holy 
Spirit which proceedeth from the Father. 

When one comes to weigh the concerns of eternity 
against the shifting panorama of the present state 
of being, how precious and reassuring it is to know 
and realize that he is at one with the Father and with 
the Son, and that therefore whatever may happen, all 
will and must be well. Do clouds gather and storms 
rage — the Father Almighty reigns above them. 

Do disappointment and suffering and uncontrolla- 
ble grief let down their pall of darkness upon the heart, 
in the starless night of seeming fate — 

"Faith lends her realizing light," 

and the night lifts. Does death approach — the eyes 
close upon the murky environment of things perish- 
ing, to open upon the quenchless radiance of things 
eternal, and all is well. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 351 

"God's ways are always right 
And love is o'er them all; 
Though far above our sight, 

Though grief benight our way, 

'Twill make the joy more dear, 
That comes with dawning day. 

The path that Jesus trod, 

Tho* rough and dark it be, 
Leads him to heaven and God." 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

The Ministry of Works. 

John Stuart Mill understands Christianity to be the 
maxims and precepts contained in the New Testament, 
and Mr. Mill is fairly representative of an influential 
class of distinguished skeptics. He says of Christian 
morality, it is negative rather than positive, passive 
rather than active, etc. In its precepts — ^^Thoushalt 
not" predominates over ^^Thou shalt." 

This may be said, no doubt, of Old Testament 
morality, but certainly it cannot, with any truth, of 
Christianity. The one summing up of Christian 
ethics, given by the Master himself, will not justify 
such a charge — Thou shalt^ reads the two command- 
ments upon which Jesus said hang all the Law and 
the Prophets. Confucius had said, ^*Do not unto 
others what you desire others should not do unto 
you," but Jesus says, ^ ^Whatsoever ye would that 
others should do unto you do ye even so unto them" 
— a teaching broader and more aggressive. Repent 
of your sins, forgive them who trespass against, love 
one another, do good to them who despitefuUy use you 
and persecute you, love your enemies, etc. Where, 
Mr. Mills, is your predominance of Thou shalt not — 
where your passive, negative morality? ^^The doc- 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 353 

trines of the Founder of the Christian system," he 
says, ^'contain but a part of the truth," and so small 
a part that he thinks no system of ethics can be reared 
upon it.^ 

Such a charge, coming from one who understands 
Christianity to be but the ^ ^maxims and precepts con- 
tained in the New Testament, "appears on its face as a 
half confessed solecism. No one who has any just 
conception of Christianity can think of it as consisting 
of maxims and precepts. It is possible that in his 
view of it, it would indeed ^'contain but a part of the 
truth," and ^'fall," as he asserts, ^'far below the 
ancients," because he saw so small a part of it. 

It is most evident everywhere that Jesus depended 
comparatively little upon maxims and precepts. 
When Demosthenes was requested to define eloquence 
he replied, ^^action" — ^^it is action." If you were to 
interrogate the Founder of the Christian system what 
constitutes morality, he would reply, action — 
^' Works.'' ^^Art thou he that should come, or look we 
for another?" — inquired John, through messengers 
sent to Jesus. ^^Go tell John what? — the things ye 
do hear and see; the blind receive their sight, the 
lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the dead are 
raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to 
them." He did not send word back to John as he 
might have done — I am he whom 3^ou yourself 
announced as the ^^Lamb of God thattaketh away the 

I. Liberty, p. 98. 



354 THE NEW RELIGION. 

sin of the world," and upon whom you saw the '^Spirit 
of God descending as a dove and resting upon him." 
Whatever significance this announcement and revela- 
tion from heaven may have had, it was less as a 
proof of his Messiahship than the works which he was 
doing. 

No great reformer ever depended so little upon 
maxims and precepts, and so much upon example as 
did Jesus. He appeals to his own example as fur- 
nishing the most authoritative attestation possible of 
his own divine mission. ^^The very works that I do 
— they bear witness of me." If for nothing else, 
believe me ''for the very works^ sake.'" So completely 
did Mr. Mill misapprehend the whole drift and scope 
of Christianity. And this misapprehension is yet the 
mistake of half the Christian w^orld. 

To subscribe a creed and join a church, and thus 
take sides with Christian people, has passed too 
current for practical Christianity among those who, 
like Mr. Mill, have been able to see in it only the 
maxims and precepts contained in the New 
Testament. 

''I am the Light of the world" — more than a 
preceptor. I exhibit a new life. I manifest a new 
spirit. I look to different purposes. I inspire better 
hopes. While I am in the world I am the light of 
the world. But I go to the Father. Following me 
and becoming like me you become the light of the 
world. Let your light shine, therefore, that others 
peeing your good works may glorify the Father in 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 355 

Heaven. My mission ends. As the Father hath sent 
me so send I you. Jno. 20: 21. It is yours now to 
take up and prolong this work. Ye are the hght of 
the world — the salt of the earth — you must take my 
place. O Master, too imperfect, too frail are we. 
You may not have my wisdom. You have not my 
responsibility. 

You have my love — an experience in kind like mine, 
and the love that makes it my meat and drink to 
do the Father's will, will make it yours to do the 
same. 

But remember, ^^I am the vine, ye are the branches. 
The branch cannot bear fruit except it abide in the 
vine. No more can ye except ye abide in me." 
Jno. 15: 4. Your lives must be like mine — the same 
in spirit, in feeling and purpose, the same in faith 
and trust in God — differing indeed in sturdy strength 
and robustness, as the trunk differs from the branches, 
but of the same sap and fruitage. If any one will be 
my disciple let him take up his cross as I have taken 
up mine, and follow me — I have led the way. 

Is it said that this is raising the standard too high 
— that mere men are too gross and selfish — they will 
never come up to it? He resisted not evil, submitted 
to abuse, returned good for evil, loved all men, loved 
even his enemies, and prayed for his malicious perse- 
cutors and murderers — such virtues are too high — 
who among men can hope to attain such heights? 
And then what? Is there no redemption? Is 
humanity doomed? Or have we, after all, indications 



356 THE NEW RELIGION. 

here and there that such virtues are possible to men? 
Did not Moses so love his people that he was ready 
to die for them? Did not Socrates, for the love of the 
right, submit to abuse and to death? Did not Stephen 
pray, ^*Lord, lay not this sin to their charge?*' Does 
not the mother offer herself a sacrifice for her child? 
And have there not been martyrs to the truth and the 
right in all ages? Is the standard too high? 

Resist not evil. Don't fight back and wrangle and 
quarrel. It will not do any good. It will do harm. 
It will put out your light. 

If one shows greed and over-reaches you, prove to 
him that you are above all such practice — that your 
metal is of a different kind. To prove this may take 
your cloak, or more than that; but prove it plainly to 
him. He needs the reproof of such an example. It 
will do him good, and you owe it to him; give him 
your cloak also. He has struck you on one cheek, 
turn the other. Your liberality will show forth 
his selfishness in strong light and possibly reform 
him. Love your enemies. There is more in them 
than enmity to you — a great deal more, and much 
that is good and worthy of your love. You must not 
excuse or condone the wrong you see them do. Sin 
is sin, crime is crime, and hateful in the sight of God 
and good men. Your worst enemy may 3^et become an 
angel, there is such a substratum of goodness in him. 

But, if the demands of Christian morality yet seem 
great, we know that there is possible to human nature 
that which makes hard things easy. It would seem a 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 357 

hard thing to shut up a noble woman for thirty years 
to the toil, and care, and anxiety of caring for a family 
of children. What solicitude, and self-denial, and 
sacrifice does it all imply! But a noble woman will 
do it all, and chooses to do it. She does not realize 
it to be a hard thing to do. 

Christian morality requires only that the disciple 
shall follow his Master. 

In social and religious life Jesus differed from other 
men more in some respects, and less in others, than 
most people imagine. He mingled freely with 
other men, went often among the poor, associated 
with them on easy terms, as you and I could 
do. He had about him no airs of special sanctity, 
and we need not have. In appearance and manner 
of life he was less an ascetic than the Baptist, less 
even than some very moderate Christians of the 
present day. 

He was, it would seem, quite a man of the world, 
and really somewhat destitute of traditional piety, as 
some thought, in view of his conduct among publicans, 
and on the Sabbath day. 

He was not selfish in any bad sense, nor do we need 
to be. 

He was always ready to help and to give, when 
there was need, and so should we be. 

He saw the danger of wealth, and undue attachment 
to this world, and avoided them, as we should. 

He recognized the ' 'eternal verities" — truth, jus- 



358 THE NEW RELIGION. 

tice, goodness, and cherished them, just as we should. 
Why not? 

In spirit and affection he was simple, devoted, 
transparent, child-like, as we might be and ought 
to be. 

He sought to make peace among men, explained 
how they could do the same. 

The standard is not too high. 

Thanks to a more enlightened age, you will not be 
called on to face the Sanhedrim nor the cross, nor the 
stake, but you will need the Christ-integrity all the 
same. The Christian code, and your own manhood, 
for that matter, require it. 

Let us banish, then, the suspicion, tacitly admitted 
by half the Christian world, that Christian morality, so 
beautiful in the outline of its teachings, is, after all, 
impracticable. This suspicion hurts. It tends to 
excuse and justify a low grade of morality — a grade 
of morality little if any better, but certainly not worse, 
as Mr. Mill would have it, than that of the ancients. 

But if practicable, then incumbent. In espousing 
the cause of the New Religion you undertake to rep- 
resent and reproduce the life of the Lord Jesus Christ 
— to aid in perpetuating the work he inaugurated and 
extending it throughout the world — as the Father 
hath sent me so send I you. 

It is evident throughout that Jesus depended upon 
a good example as the chief means of commending 
and spreading the gospel. He constantly refers to 
his own example as evidence of his own commission. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 359 

It was his as the great exemplar, and he felt it to be 
his, to set an example of fidelity under an ordeal of 
trial and suffering that swept the whole field of 
temptation, touching him at all points, and exhaust- 
ing every motive to infidelity. 

It was not enough that God should communicate 
his will through angel messengers. It was necessary 
that it should be revealed to sight and sense-appre- 
hension — crystallized in the experience of actual life. 
Words, though freighted with divine wisdom, are next 
to powerless, when compared with the touching and 
transforming influence of a radiant example. 

None knew better than did Jesus the power of a 
good example to work reform. No one ever relied so 
implicitly upon personal influence and the power of a 
good example to sustain his cause. 

He literally committed it to the keeping of good 
works — to the exhibition of the Christ-life. Others 
had organized well, taught eloquently, written wisely, 
but Jesus said, '^I am the light of the world," follow 
me. To his disciples he did not say: organize, edu- 
cate, enlist the wealthy, get the popular tide at all 
cost, as reformers are wont to do, but be humble, 
love each other, minister to the needy, visit the sick 
and the imprisoned. Let your light shine. You will 
be ignored, maligned, persecuted, possibly put to 
death, only be true — let your light shine. The light 
gleaming out of dark and obscure places of the earth 
to which he knew his humble faithful disciples would 



360 THE NEW RELIGION. 

be driven was his hope for the world — his trusted 
Evangel. 

The power of example is not confined to the good 
alone. ^^If the light that is in thee be darkness how 
great is that darkness." A bad example will out- 
weigh and neutralize a great deal of precept — mere 
preaching. One bad example may curse a whole 
neighborhood — a whole generation. Behold the fasci- 
nating power of ^^fashion!" One follows another — fol- 
lows into every extreme of folly and absurdity, often 
at the expense of health and fortune. 

During the witch-craft craze many who were per- 
fectly innocent of the supposed diabolical intercourse, 
were caught up by the excitement, confessed 
implication and were put to death. 

During the persecutions of the early church, when 
even to profess one's self a Christian was the prelude 
to the sentence of death, men and women daily 
attested their devotion amid the horrors of faggot 
and flame, and the carnage of wild beasts. Their 
unflinching heroism so impressed the multitude, that, 
many converts actually sought and voluntarily pro- 
voked martyrdom, in so much that the authorities 
had to interfere and check the mania. It is not sur- 
prising that the Son of Man sought to avail himself 
of this overmastering power of example, when 
endeavoring to save the world from sin. 

When the twelve and the seventy were sent forth 
as evangelists they were not sent to indoctrinate men, 
nor to proclaim the Lamb of God as ready to be 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 361 

offered in sacrifice to offended justice. ^^Go * to 
the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and as ye go 
preach, saying, the kingdom of heaven is at hand; 
heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast 
out devils — (whatever this may mean) — freely ye have 
received, freely give." They were simply to go on 
errands of love and mercy, following his example. 

We are told that the intention gives moral quality 
to the act, and in a sense and to some extent this is 
true. A good action is not likely to spring from a 
bad intent, nor a- bad action from a good intent. The 
fact is, there are many intents good and bad which 
spring no action at all. The intention belongs to and 
affects the individual. It has in itself no ethical value. 
It may be good or bad without public benefit or public 
damage. Intentions do not constitute virtue, nor 
merit its reward. Like good precepts and good 
advice they are usually cheap if not a drug on the 
market. 

Men are so interdependent and identified with the 
common weal, in all the relations of life, that what 
belongs so exclusively to the individual as the intent 
is of little weight or moment. The author of Chris- 
tianity has taught us that virtue lies not in the inten- 
tion, but in the act. The tree is to be judged not by 
its latent capacity, but by its fruit. It is not for 
every idle thought, but for ^^every idle word" that men 
must give account. ^'By thy words shalt thou be 
justified, and by thy words shalt thou be condemned." 
The intention must crystallize into action and affect 



362 THE NEW RELIGION. 

some one for weal or woe, before it has ethical 
value. 

But you say out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, 
etc. Yes, and it is because they proceed out of the 
heart, and come to play their roll among men that 
they come to be factors of ethical results. He that 
looketh upon a woman lusting after her '^hath com- 
mitted adultery with her already in his heart. '^ Yes, 
truly. But he has not injured the woman. He has 
not outraged public decency and set the tongues of 
all the gossips going. He has not debauched public 
sentiment nor lowered the standard of public virtue, 
and cannot be called to account in any court, human 
or divine, for doing any of these things. But the 
cherished lust, however, has wrought its baneful effect 
upon himself. It has debased his moral sense. It 
has lowered his self respect. It has sunk him lower 
in the scale of conscious purity. It has made him 
more a brute and less a man. But the crime is his 
own and has ethical significance only as it tends to 
weaken and disqualify him for those helpful ministries 
in which his fellowmen have something of vested 
rights. 

On the other hand a good deed, though it spring 
from selfish motives, and may therefore prove to be 
empty and worthless or even injurious to him who 
performs it, yet has ethical value, since it helps some 
one in the struggle of life and contributes to the sum 
of human well being. It is love — a pure and holy 
love — that consecrates both the intention and the ac »< 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 363 

and constitutes them a blessing. As a rule we are not 
to judge the act by the intention, but the intention 
by the act, because of its external relations and greater 
ethical import. 

It is the life revealed in action that constitutes the 
individual a power among men. Jesus bore himself 
with exemplary virtue and goodness always and 
everywhere — through evil report and good, through 
obstinate bigotry and superstition, through malice and 
treachery, through wickedness in high places and in 
low, in Gethsemane, in the courts of the High Priest 
and of Pilate, in the hands of the mob and on the 
cross, — in all, and through all, he bore himself with 
such dauntless courage, with such sweetness of 
temper, and yearning love for his misguided persecu- 
tors, as to astonish and most powerfully to impress all 
beholders, and to spring a reaction in his favor that 
seems rather to increase than decrease in force with 
the passing centuries. 

And hence his measureless power for good, his 
unrivalled success as a reformer, his authority as a 
teacher come from God. He was more than a victim 
offered in sacrifice, more than a substituted sufferer 
for the sins of mankind. He was a revelation, an 
inspiring exemplar, the Light of the World; and he 
who will be his disciple is to take up his cross and in 
all this follow him. 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

The Ministry of Works — Supplemental. 

One soul, with one God and destiny — the aura of 
the New ReHgion. 

The Founder of Christianity steadily addressed 
himself to the individual. He summons the indi- 
vidual soul into the presence of God for review and 
judgment. He lays upon the individual the obliga- 
tions of a holy life, and makes it his duty to let his 
light shine. Even in matters of worship the indi- 
vidual, and not the congregation, nor a substituted 
priest, must be the actor. When he would pray he 
is to enter into his closet, and having shut the door, 
there alone he shall pray to the Father who is in 
secret. 

The College of Apostles was in no proper sense an 
organized body — no constitution, no creed, no grip, 
nor bond, nor baptism — nothing to interfere with the 
autonomy of the individual. Jesus himself belonged 
to no organization, nor did he recommend organiza- 
tion to those who were to take up and carry for- 
ward his work. 

The sense of personal obligation, binding naen to 
all helpful ministries, is the measure of the Christ-life. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 365 

and the basis of the world's hope as set forth in the 
New Rehgion. 

For 200 years or more it was the practice of the 
Christian preacher to go out among the people, and 
to do substantially as Jesus himself, and the Apostles, 
and Paul had done — to go about doing good as they 
had opportunity, preaching repentance for the remis- 
sion of sins, and the coming of the Kingdom of 
Heaven. They defined no creeds, built no churches, 
established no priesthood, claimed no ecclesiastical 
authority as binding in law. 

In time, however, when to become a Christian was to 
encounter persecution, and the probability of a martyr's 
death, it was most natural that the Christian should 
desire the largest possible sympathy and moral sup- 
port from his fellow Christians, and, if there were no 
other reasons for it, this desire seemed to be a suffi- 
cient reason for ecclesiastical union; and then, too, 
if Christians had to withstand persecution, and go to 
the stake for their faith, it seemed most proper that 
their faith should be clearly defined, and definitely 
stated, in order that there be no misapprehension — no 
mistakes made in the dire emergencies which awaited 
them. 

Besides, Constantino had the penetration to see 
that a concentration of the widespread Christian 
forces — forces which everywhere were proving ade- 
quate to conquer, would greatly strengthen hmi in his 
possession of political power, and he therefore led 
off in favor of ecclesiastical organization. 



366 THE NEW RELIGION. 

Hence, both a strongly organized church and an 
elaborate creed as early as A. D. 325. 

But after all, these needs, so keenly experienced by 
Christians, were born of their fears, and it may well 
be doubted whether both the organization and the 
creed have helped more than they have hurt the pro- 
gress of Christianity. 

The Master had said, ^*When they bring you before 
synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, be not 
anxious how or what ye shall answer, for the Holy 
Spirit will teach you in that very hour what ye ought 
to say;^ thus providing in advance for the direst straits 
without the intervention of external helps. 

The reader need not be reminded that a merciless 
and crushing despotism, enslaving and degrading a 
large part of mankind, grew out of this organizing 
and creed-making business; and its evil working is 
plainly not yet ended. One of its evils, and the one 
which claims our attention in this connection, is its 
tendency to lessen the the sense of personal obliga- 
tion to attend to the v^ants of men as they present 
themselves to the individual Christian. 

With a strong church in the field, or several in the 
same field, as we have them now, to care for the 
interests of religion, it is very easy for one to conclude 
that if he but give liberally to support the church, he 
is playing his part, without drawing upon his time 
and business for the details of Christian duty; and, 

I. Luke 12: II. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 367 

accordingly, he buckles down to business, and rele- 
gates the duty of letting his light shine, to the church. 
A writer in a leading religious journal, just to hand, 
says: ^*Helpless invalids must be cared for by their 
friends, if they have them; if friendless, then by the 
church or the community!"^ Here it is in plain Eng- 
lish. The tendency is unmistakable. The Priest 
and the Levite, who passed by on the other side, and 
left the poor fellow who had fallen among thieves 
unhelped, must have felt very much like this modern 
priest. The man had no friends and they left him to 
be cared for by the church, or the community. 

Between the constantly recurring need of money 
to keep up the church and pay the minister's salary — 
to meet the claims of subordinate missionary societies, 
mite societies, sewing circles, etc., id omne genus, and 
added to these, the rivalry of congregational leader- 
ship, the last dollar that can be squeezed out the 
pious individual member is paid over to organized 
agencies — paid over, possibly with the best of motives, 
and applied, too,- possibly, to the furtherance of good 
causes, and it is very natural that the ordinary Chris- 
tian should come to believe and feel that he has, in 
this way, done his duty. Accordingly, like the 
brother mentioned, he relegates the cases of personal 
need which come within his knowledge to the 
^^church" and the ^^community. " But is this Chris- 
tian altruism? 

I. Prof. H. F. Fisk, D. D., in N. W. C, Ad., May 14, '90, 



368 THE NEW RELIGION. 

I know we are told the times have greatly changed 
since Jesus wrought his helpful ministries in Galilee. 
The twenticith century, with its institutions and its 
civilization, is upon us. Things are done now on a large 
scale. I grant. Everything is organized, from a mighty 
church seeking to set up her throne of power in all 
lands, to a prayer meeting or a child's play. The 
individual is absorbed. The big fish have the wave. 
Of course the stronger the church the better. The 
stronger and richer, the more talent it can command, 
the more imposing cathedrals and temples it can 
build, and the sooner it will ^^fill the earth with the 
knowledge of the Lord." 

But candidly, is the method of this century, with its 
display of large means — its roar and thunder and 
tramping of feet — its glitter and glare of gold — an 
improvement upon that of the first and second cen- 
turies, with their small beginning, their comparative 
destitution of means — their humility and the little 
'^leaven" that was to ^ ^leaven the whole lump?" 
What is the proof of it? The Roman empire was 
conquered to Christianity during the first 200 years. 
What Roman empire has been conquered to Chris- 
tianity within the last 200 years? What has been the 
annual increase per centum of the population of genu- 
ine, not noniinal Christians of the last 200 years, with 
all the advantage of multiplied centers of operation, 
better knowledge and exhaustless resources, as com- 
pared with the increased per centum of population 
during the first 200 years? Before great cathedrals 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 369 

were built, or elaborate creeds were made up by 
ecclesiastical councils, and before organization had 
become a ^^craze," the New Religion had encountered 
ignorance and vice — wickedness in ^^high places" — 
all the forms of selfishness and depravity — it had 
encountered Paganism, with its learning and philoso- 
phy, and won glorious victories. Now, enshrined in 
strong and wealthy organizations, and with modern 
methods, is it doing more or better? 

A single church in New York is said to be worth 
$150,000,000.^ Another in the same city $100,000,- 
000.2 'pj^g Presbyterians have $300,000,000 in Chi- 
cago,2 and all the leading denominations count their 
wealth by millions. Are they likely to do more for the 
spread of genuine Christianity than did a proportional 
number of the early Christians following the methods 
of the Apostles and Paul and the preachers of the first 
century, before there were either creeds or cathedrals 
or an ecclesiastical priesthood? Or is it another case 
of Goliath in his armor and David with his sling? 

In union there is strength. Certainly there is. If 
you want to pull up sycamine trees and remove 
mountains into the sea, the more spikes and shovels 
and levers you employ the sooner you will accomplish 
your purpose. But in the case before us it may be a 
question whether you can use spikes and shovels. 

1. See Fo7'tcni, Nov., '8g. 

2. Retiring Moderator's address before Presbyterian Asserr.- 
bly, 1890. 



370 THE NEW RELIGION. 

There are things which cannot be put into an 
organization. You can only put into an organization 
what has a value in common, or is supposed, at least, 
to have such value. But your religion is worth more 
to you than it is to your neighbor, and his religion is 
worth more to him than it is to you; and so of all the 
rest. Each one's religion belongs to himself and 
ought to be sacred against all comers. In the nature 
of things it cannot be built into an organization. The 
effort to do this has been a disastrous failure in all 
time. It has rent the Christian world into many 
fragments, and caused an immense and cruel waste 
of means and engendered an amount of sectarian 
strife and bitterness that is sickening to contemplate. 

If you think best you can build round an ^'ism,'* 
and you may persuade a good man}^ to help you. 
But in the public mind "isnis^^ are at discount. 

Catholicism, Methodism, Presbyterianism, Bap- 
tistism, and the rest — each and all are something less 
than Christianity. They have ear-marks that disfig- 
ure them, ^^shibboleths" that betray narrowness, if 
nothing worse. They beget suspicion of selfishness 
and offend public taste. They are not the best thing 
to build around and build up. 

Besides they are dying out. They will not live for- 
ever. Some have already died, and more are dying, 
and I do not believe that to invest in them largely is 
to make the best use of the ^^Lord's money." 

The twentieth century civilization is not favorable 
to the spread of genuine Christianity. It depends too 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 37I 

much Upon organization and hurrah — upon marble 
and gold — and too little upon personal piety and good- 
ness — the leaven that is to leaven the whole lump. 

Sixty years ago Dr. Channing said, organized 
societies at present tend strongly to excess, and espe- 
cially menace that individuality of character for 
which they can yield no adequate compensation. It 
is notoriously evident, at least to those who have not 
been caught up by the craze for organization, that the 
fears here expressed were well founded. Everywhere 
there are ^ ^leaders, " a few, followers, many — leaders, 
sometimes selfish, ambitious, unscrupulous, and gen- 
erally overrated — followers, wanting in individuality 
and true manhood, and ready on occasion to cry, 
^Crucify him! Crucify him!" 

The glorified civilization of the present imposes 
conditions unfavorable to the spread of Christianity. 
It makes a god of wealth. It fosters a disposition to 
indulge in short-lived and debasing pleasures. It 
influences men to lay up their treasures upon the 
earth. It dwarfs the individual and his light-shining 
capacity. The times have indeed changed since 
Jesus sent his reply back to John in prison. Reversing 
the order, the rich^ more than tlie poor have the gospel 
preached to them. Silk and diamonds lend their 
attractions to pulpit and pew, without increasing their 
power for good. Wealth is decoloring and detoning 
Christly goodness in highly cultivated circles, and 
many of the modern apostles of Christianity, without 
any great amount of the scruple and tender conscience, 



372 THE NE\V RELIGION. 

such as was Paul's, are resting serenely in the lap of 
wealthy and fashionable congregations. 

Organization is in the air of the present. It is seen 
in trusts and syndicates — in everything and every- 
where. The individual is seldom seen in his own 
capacity. 

It may well be doubted whether a genuine Christian 
socialism is now possible without a thorough recon- 
struction of the church and Christian institutions. 
The individual has well nigh disappeared from human 
society. If you find him struggling for recognition, 
you find him in an unequal contest, pitted against 
some one or more great combinations, social, political, 
or ecclesiastical, that are ready to club him down as a 
^^crank,'^ and hoot him out of society. It is worth 
about all that a man holds dear in society, to be a true 
man, and dare to do his own thinking. The tendency 
of this organizing age is to debase the masses by 
stripping the individual — the unit of the masses — of 
his sense of personal capacity and responsibility. In 
social life, fashion, in politics, party, and in religion, 
the churches, have usurped the functions of the indi- 
vidual and sway the scepter of a debasing tyranny 
over the masses. Mr. S. W. Dike, in the January, 
1890, Century, has noticed this tendency among Chris- 
tians to rely too much on the church. He says: 

^^It is time we ceased to make people feel that there 
is no salvation except by way of the church door, in 
simple justice to him who said T am the door.' * * 
No form of ecclesiasticism, not even that of the most 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 373 

orthodox protestantism, any more than that of Rome, 
can shut him within church walls, or look to the con- 
gregation as the place for the greater part of his 
work.'' 

A Nashville editor said: — ^^It is a malign paradox 
of ecclesiastical history that as power declines ma- 
chinery increases." A New York editor, commenting 
on this sentiment, says: — ^^The machinery now 
deemed necessary to carry forward the work which 
was originally committed by Christ and his apostles to 
the loyalty and devotion and philanthropy of indi- 
vidual Christians, is something appalling." 

And another responds: — ^^Machinery has little func- 
tion in Christ's ministry. * * Christ's ministry and 
method were at least typical and illustrative of the 
economy and secret of greatest success in bringing 
the world to accept him as Savior and Master." 

There are in the United States about 90,000 
preachers of the gospel. If they all had the love and 
zeal that sent Paul out through the gentile world, and 
the self-sacrificing conscience that made him work 
with his own hands, lest he might become ' 'burden- 
some," how soon would the light of the blessed gospel 
flood all this land! 

Th'e census report of 1880 gives the population of 
the United States as 50,000,000, and the number of 
Christians of all denominations as 16,000,000 — one 
to less than every four of the population. Suppose 
every one was a good Samaritan kind of Christian, 
with his oil and wine and his two pence at the inn, 



374 THE NEW RELIGION. 

and his promise of more, what would be the result 
before the next moon? 

Another cause, it is believed, operates to lessen the 
sense of personal obligation to active beneficence. 

There is a religious cultus which makes the not-me 
about everything in religion and the me nothing, or next 
to nothing. The sinner is taught that he is a poor, 
totally depraved and helpless mortal whom nothing 
can save but God himself, by a fiat of his redeeming 
power. 

This, because of his great love, the Heavenly 
Father is disposed to do. The sinner must be 
'^redeemed," ^'washed," ^'purified," made holy by 
the divine will and power. He must, indeed, become 
willing to be saved, but here responsibility seems to 
end. He must be saved by grace through faith, and 
the grace is the grace of the divine Not-Me. 

Henceforth, what concerns him most is, how^ to keep 
his religion, and in the end make sure of heaven. ^^I 
want to be good," said a brother in so many words, 
the other day, in a class-meeting, ^ ^because I want to 
be happy.'' This is the feeling. Under this cultus, 
if you attend to what are called ^^the means of grace" 
— prayer meeting, public worship, etc., you will be 
most likely to maintain your Christian integrity, and 
secure the '^crown of rejoicing" and ^'harp of gold." 
No altruism, — none of the candle burning itself out 
to give light to other people. It is the Old Religion 
against the New, and borders upon selfishness. 

It did not seem to have occurred to the brother 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 375 

that, born into the kingdom, he must go out of him- 
self, and, at the cost of himself, he must do some- 
thing to help somebody in need, that he must become 
a supplement a7y Christy commissioned to help save 
the world from sin. 

Under this cultus the redeemed sinner owes every- 
thing to God, and what more or better can he do than 
to serve God, that is, to say his prayers regularly, to 
attend upon public worship faithfully, to support the 
church, reverence the minister whom God has sent 
him, read his bible, etc. 

But all this is done around one center, and that 
center is himself — his own happiness. 

Such a cultus tends to dwarf the sense of personal 
obligation to render service to the outside world, 
lying in poverty and squalor and wretchedness, by 
exalting those objective agencies and instrumentali- 
ties upon which the ^^believer*' is made to feel his 
own salvation largely depends. 

Religion is the chief concern. Morality is good 
among men, but some very profane and wicked men 
are good moralists and upright enough. But moral- 
ity is human, religion is divine. Religion is prayer. 
Religion is worship, and getting close to God, and 
having rapturous communion and fellowship with the 
Most High. 

I could forever stay 

In such a frame as this. 
And sit and sing myself away 

To everlasting bliss. 



376 THE NEW RELIGION. 

In this habitual ecstacy what to him are the hunger 
and thirst and nakedness of the outside world? What 
are helpless poverty and sickness and want? His 
back is to the world, his face toward heaven, God 
is all in all, and glory his destiny. 

The teaching is at fault. It leaves out works. 
It leaves out light-shining. It permits the votary 
to forget that, ^^As the Father hath sent me so send I 
you. ' * 

In that dramatic representation of the last judgment 
given by Matt, the results of life are summed up and 
the value of those helpful ministries which are made 
so abundantly possible in this present unequal life of 
mankind are most powerfully set forth: 

^^When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and 
all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon 
the throne of his glory: and before him shall be 
gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one 
from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from 
the goats. And he shall set the sheep on his right 
hand, and the goats upon the left. Then shall the 
King say to them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed 
of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you 
from the foundation of the world. For I was an 
hungered, and ye gave meat; I was thirsty, and ye 
gave me drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me in; 
naked, and ye clothed me; I was sick, and ye visited 
me; I was in prison, and ye came unto me. ' ' Astound- 
ing! They themselves had not known the moral value 
of their benevolence and their benefactions. 'When 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 377 

saw we thee an hungered, and fed thee? or thirsty, 
and gave thee drink? When saw we thee a stranger, 
and took thee in? Or naked, and clothed thee? Or 
when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto 
thee? And then the King shall answer and say unto 
them, '^Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have 
done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, 
ye have done it unto me. 

^^Then shall he also say unto them on his left hand, 
Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, pre- 
pared for the devil and his angels: for I was an hun- 
gered, and ye gave me no meat; I was thirsty, and ye 
gave me no drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me 
not in; naked, and ye clothed me not; sick and in 
prison, and ye visited me not/' 

Possible! They had not waked up to the damning 
character of that close-fisted selfishness which could 
go stalking amid want and squalor and suffering 
unaffected. 

''When saw we thee an hungered, or athirst, or a 
stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not 
minister unto thee? Then shall he answer them say- 
ing. Verily I say unto you. Inasmuch as ye did it 
not to one of the least of these, ye did it not unto 
me. And these shall go away into everlasting pun- 
ishment; but the righteous into life eternal. Matt. 
25: 31-46. 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

The Ministry of Works — Supplemental. 

The following conversation between two New 
Yorkers, one a popular minister of the gospel, and 
the other a Christian business man, will explain itself: 

A. Good morning, Mr. B., I believe I saw you in 
the congregation at my church yesterday. 

B. Yes, sir; I was there. 

A. Do you reside in the city? 

B. I do. 

A. You don't get round to my church often. I 
think I have not noticed you before. 

B. No sir, I don't attend church services very 
regularly; I go when I have time and feel that I need 
such service. 1 work hard through the week, and I 
generally feel by the end of the week that I need a 
little rest, and then, too, the Sabbath furnishes me 
the most leisure I can command for reading, which I 
very much enjoy. 

A. I think you would find that it would help you 
to maintain your religious life — your spirituality and 
^'growth in grace," if you would attend the church 
services regularly; and, as to rest, you could get that 
quite as well, or better, at the church. 

B. People evidently make very different estimates 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 379 

of the value of ^'church services.'* Church-going 
people seem to hold them sacred and almost indis- 
pensable to a good life. But I do not care to d'.scuss 
the measure of their utility now — I want time to read, 
and, besides, having some notoriety among the poor, 
I often have occasion to attend some one's need on 
the Sabbath. 

A. The teaching at the church might be valuable 
— possibly as valuable as that of your book; and, 
would not the ministries of the church during public 
worship qualify you all the better for your ministries 
to the poor. You cannot do much for the poor except 
to supply their present need, and this at best would 
be to them a service of somewhat doubtful value — it 
might in the end do them more harm than good. 

B. I beg your pardon — the poor generally need 
sympathy. The world turns its back upon them and 
they are likely to come to feel that they are aban- 
doned of men and forgotten of God. One's friendly 
presence, even for a few moments, as occasion may 
offer, gives them cheer and comfort, and will do them 
much good, and especially so if one has something in 
his hand for the needy mother and children. 

A. But according to my experience it is difficult 
to reach them for any permanent good. For the 
most part, they live on a very low plane, and are so 
gross and unappreciative you can hardly start a 
thought of the higher life. What do most of them 
care for their souls? Many of them hardly know they 



380 THE NEW RELIGION. 

havs souls. Alas! there is no great encouragement 
to try to help them. 

B. And yet, however low and gross, their desti- 
tution, as I often see it, affects me keenly. I cannot 
forget that they are of one blood with myself, and 
made ^^in the image of God," and if I cannot minister 
to their higher nature, as you seek to do, I can, at least, 
do something in the way of supplying; their physical 
needs, and this sometimes seems to me to be much. 

A. Oh, I grant that using prudence and circum- 
spection, we must not let the poor suffer. But the 
poor we shall always have with us. Mere physical 
need is, when we come to think of it, a low grade of 
need. The body soon dies; the soul is immortal. 
You help the body, and, in the nature of things,, soon 
all is gone; you help the soul and your work will 
remain. You yourself need the services of the sanc- 
tuary to nourish your moral and religious nature, and 
prepare you for the life immortal. We owe more to 
God than we do to our poor neighbors, and it reverses 
things to serve them more and him less. There is a 
vaporing sympathy which would exhaust measurele^j 
resources upon short-lived charities, and render more 
durably useful benefactions impossible — a sympathy 
which hurts more than it helps the world. 

B. You state the case strongly, and I know that 
you express a feeling widespread, even in Christian 
circles. Prudence in giving must be counted among 
the virtues, since we know that there are those who 
are base enough to take advantage of our liberality 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 381 

and abuse it. But on the other hand you will allow 
that there is danger of this special plea of prudence 
playing into the hands of a blighting selfishness. It 
is to be noticed that Jesus, having no money, went 
down among the poor in boon companionship, eating 
and drinking with them — even with * ^publicans and 
sinners." He did not seem to be quite willing that 
they should be left to the degradation to which they 
had been reduced by sin and a hard fortune. The fact 
that only one of the ten lepers he had healed returned 
to give glory to God did not put a stop to the leper- 
healing business. He discouraged any too severe 
discrimination among thu needy, by calling attention 
to the fact that God sends his rain and sunshine upon 
the just and the unjust. If ten righteous could be 
found in the cities of the plain, they were not to be 
destroyed. It were an inexcusably wicked distrust 
that would let the deserving poor suffer because the 
well-meant charity might be occasionally abused. 

A. But financial sympathy is more liable to abuse 
than spiritual sympathy. You give your money, and 
it may be spent upon appetite — upon intoxicants — 
upon inordinate passion, and so do more harm than 
good. You give moral instruction, use you influence 
to make the life better, and if you have done no good, 
you have, at least, done no harm. 

B. Plausible, certainly; and, since we owe most 
to God, you think that as a first consideration we 
should serve God, and that, if we do this, the service 
of men will not be neglected. But please, hoiv will 



382 THE NEW RELIGION. 

you serve God without serving men? Will your prayers 
and sanctuary services please God and render him 
more propitious? Will they gratify him — do him 
good? We have authority for believing that many 
who are well up in religion — many who say ^^Lord, 
Lord/* ^ 'shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven/' 
It is granted that, if your worship be sincere and 
true, it will do you good, and that it should not be neg- 
lected. But how else or who else can it benefit? 
Herein is my Father glorified that ye bear much fruit. 
Verily I say unto you — please note the emphasis — 
' 'Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of 
these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." Here 
we have a ''service" which is recognized as the "serv- 
ice of God." 

A. As to doing God himself good — serving him in 
that sense no mortal, of course, can serve him. But 
there are other ways of serving men than by feeding 
and clothing them. They really need to be saved 
from their sins — converted — more than they need to 
be fed and clothed. Their highest possible interests 
are at stake, and he that succeeds in getting a soul 
converted "shall save a soul from death and cover a 
multitude of sins." As a minister of the gospel this 
is my peculiar work and responsibility. 

B. A most noble work — indeed a "high calling." 
My mission is more humble. But, if you give what 
is needed, and what is felt to be needed — mark what 
I say — you will touch deep into the heart. Nine 
times out of ten you will stir the better nature, and 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 383 

there will be no abuse of your generosity. About a 
week ago I heard of a neighboring destitute family 
and I called in to see them. A sad scene presented 
Itself. They told me you had been there. Do you 
remember them — on Water St., No. ? 

A. Oh yes— several of them sick, and very poor. 
I don't wonder at their being sick, living in such a 
place — should think they would all die of filth and 
malaria. 

B. Did you talk with them? 

A. Yes, quite at length. I tried to tell them of 
Jesus and God and heaven — a better world. The 
children who were able stood round staring at me. 
The mother seemed feeble and stupid; the father 
coarse, stupidly inattentive, and evidently shiftless. 
I felt sorry for them. I prayed with them and for 
them, and gave them a bible. What more could I 
do? What a pity that people will not hear the truth 
and learn to do better before such grossness and hard- 
ness overtake them. It is hard to reach people so 
low in the scale of being. 

B. I must say, I was deeply affected, especially 
when I remembered that, without doubt, there are 
thousands and thousands of such and similar cases of 
destitution in this one great city. I inquired a little into 
the history of this family. The husband had been a 
shoemaker, and this was his brief story: — ^T had no 
great difficulty in my early married life in providing 
for my family; but after they began to make shoes by 
machinery the price of work went down till I was 



384 THE NEW RELIGION. 

compelled to quit the business. I had to catch jobs 
and do what I could. And then I took sick and lost 
a good deal of time, and so got behind, and have never 
been able to catch up. And, to make matters worse, 
my wife took sick and has never recovered her health, 
and now the doctors say she has the consumption, and 
here we are — God only knows what is to become 
of us." 

I said to him, ^^My dear sir, we will get you out of 
this. God has been good to me, and I have some 
means, and we will get you out of this.'' I found a 
girl and employed her to go to work for them and 
clean up. I provided a new and comfortable bed 
upon which the poor woman could rest. I ordered 
up what was needed from the store and the grocery. 
I furnished shoes and clothes for the children, and I 
said to them, ^'Now take courage. I will not forget 
you and God will not forget you, nor cease to love 
you. Here is ten dollars, if you should need anything 
before I get back to see you. I will call again next 
Sabbath." On leaving them there was a scene. Big 
tears were rolling down the father's radiant face. He 
was too much affected to speak. The mother, stretch- 
ing out her trembling, bony hand sobbed out — ^^O 
how we thank you! God bless and reward you, if we 
never can." And the children were happier than they 

could tell. Hard to reach people on so Iowa 

pla7ie of being! You seemed to think they had scarcely 
anything of the better nature left within them, so 
stupid and morally insensate were they. But I did 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 385 

not find them so. I doubt whether an angel in heaven 
could have struck a sweeter note of praise and grati- 
tude, or poured a grander symphony into the ears of 
the All Father than did that family on Water St. — 
And, of course, I will stand by them. I will see 
them out. They are of my own blood — my neighbors 
— and as a Christian I cannot do less. 

Your higher ministries did not reach them. My 
humble ministries did reach them. You gave them 
what you thought they most needed, I gave them what 
they felt they most needed. Through the felt needs 
you can walk straight into the better nature. You can- 
not begin at the top and build downward. You can- 
not climb up to heaven without a ladder. Jacob's 
angels could not. It is not a matter of impossibility. 
It is a question of how. Your means are not well 
adapted to accomplish your ends. You seek to carry 
forward the work inaugurated by the Lord Jesus, but 
the tv/entieth century is upon us and you have found 
a different way of doing things. He went among the 
poor and destitute with more than a bible in his 
hand and prayers with them and for them. He went 
with a spirit of sympathy and fellow feeling that 
opened his heart and his hand. You did not. You 
went with your sermon and exhortation. You went 
with kind words and good advice, all of which is 
always theap in the market, because it is of little 
value, and you failed. *^If a brother or a sister be 
naked and in lack of daily food, and one of you say 
UUto thcjm; Go in peace, be ye warmed and filled; 



386 THE NEW RELIGION. 

and yet ye give them not the things needful to 
the body, what doth it profit?^ Your rich congrega- 
tion arranges expensive appointments, and you pre- 
pare elaborate and elegant sermons, but I am quite 
sure that no one of your public services in a year past 
has produced a more profound impression than the 
humble benefactions bestowed on this poor family. 
For conserving public virtue and personal piety and 
good conduct your church services may be the best 
possible. This is not my point, but, as an evangel, as a 
means of reachin g and saving the lost and the d3ang in this 
great and wicked city, your method is a comparative 
failure. Those who need most that gospel which is 
the ^/power of God unto salvation" never get into 
your fine church, and if, as you did in this case, you 
attempt to carry it to them, it is presented in such a 
way as to make it seem to them worthless. 

A. But mercy on us, man! Such reckless and 
indiscriminate charity would soon bankrupt a million- 
aire. I remember now having heard of an eccentric 
enthusiast on the subject of charity. I think I must 
have found him. 

B. But how is it? — beijig a Christian, how could I 
have done otherwise with this family, with whom now 
we have had something of a common experience? 
They are my neighbors — under the aegis of the second 
commandment. If I love them as I love myself 
could I fail to help them? You have, I understand, 

I, James z\ 15, 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 387 

an elegant family — a wife and five children — and of 
course you love them. Could you leave them down 
on Water street with a tithe of the needs of this 
family, and go on with your own abundance and com- 
fort and Christian duties, as you do now? We know 
full well that you would sink yourself to their lowest 
level, if it were necessary, to rescue them from such 
a condition of poverty and want. 

Are you, to be frank about it, quite sure that you 
really love '^your neighbor as yourself," and are, 
therefore, entitled to be called a Christian? Are we 
to understand that what 370U did for that poor family 
is the measure of your love for them? You give 
proof that you love your wife and children. You 
■ divide with them and would share fortune with them, 
whatever might happen. Where is the proof that 
you love these neighbors of yours down on Water 
street as you love yourself? Love levels things. 

It holds all your children on the same level before 
you. You could not bribe a mother to conscious 
partiality with millions. It brought the early Chris- 
tians to a level, insomuch, that for awhile they had 
'^all things common. '^ In the mind of Jesus it 
brought Jew and Gentile, Pharisee and Publican to 
the same level. Paul felt he owed the same debt to 
Greek and Roman, to Barbarian and Scythian, to 
bond and free. Love levels things and makes com- 
mon cause, and if your love don't level you down to 
something like equality in matters essential to happi- 
nessp there must be something wrong. Love hardly 



388 THE NEW RELIGION. 

stops with equality. The big boy always gives the 
better half to his little sister, and the little sister, 
in return, reciprocates her brother's generosity. And 
this overplus of giving is the dictate of true love the 
world over. But you seem to be able to stop at an 
infinite distance short of equality. I repeat, are we 
to understand that what you did for the poor family 
on Water street is the measure of your brotherly love? 
Is the love that sits blissfully in the lap of wealth — 
dresses in silks, wears diamonds and fares sump- 
tuously every day in the midst of ghastly want — is 
this kind of love, in your estimate of things. Christian 
love? 

There are certain things which we all must have or 
suffer, and to which, under the Christian regime, all 
have an equal right, among which our fathers named 
'^life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'' We 
may add, all must have food and raiment, and some- 
thing of physical comfort, of fellowship and of good 
cheer. Having these, all may be happy. Without 
them, none can be happy. True love will not — can- 
not stop short of making common cause in the essen- 
tials of human happiness. It will not permit suf- 
fering, if it be possible to prevent it, cost what it 
may. But love, less embarrassed than state legisla- 
tion for the poor, is not, as you say, indiscriminate in 
the use of means. 

It would be a great mistake to divide out your 
property with those who have but a fraction of your 
prudence and wisdom in conserving and controlling 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 389 

it. If you use judgment you will not '^cast your 
pearls before swine," nor be at a loss to find genuine 
cases of dire want in which your help is sorely needed. 
Our visit to Water street must have convinced us of 
this. 

That Water street family has as much right to be 
fed and clothed and made comfortable as I have; 
and if I have the virtue of the second commandment, 
and the means, I will not stop short of feeding and 
clothing them till they are as comfortable. This, of 
course, does not mean that I shall proceed to divide 
up all I may have left. We must be prudent, I grant 
— be careful to make good investments, but a genuine 
Christian socialism demands that these helpful bene- 
factions shall be continued until, in matters essential, 
all, the rich and the poor, are brought to a common 
level. 

A. But my good fellow, what can you hope? How 
much would it take to put good shoes and clothes on 
all the ragged poor of this one city? How much to 
put them into comfortable houses? How much to 
supply their tables as yours is supplied? What folly 
to think of doing any such thing! 

And then, too, how soon would all this expenditure 
of means disappear! You would scarcely be buried 
out of sight till the old want and squalor would come 
again, and repossess all the fields you had won to 
comfort. If the second commandment implies any 
such thing in practice, we must, with all the infidels, 
write it down impracticable. 



390 THE NEW RELIGION. 

B. Does the mere magnitude of the work paralyze 
you? Would you raise this question against your 
family whom you love? Would you not do what you 
could till you exhaust your means? Why then raise 
it against God's poor, whom you also love, if you are 
a Christian? 

A. But who are one's neighbors? There is fallacy 
somewhere. Perhaps it is in the misunderstanding 
of terms. 

B. In the case given by the Master the man who 
fell among thieves was neighbor to the good Samari- 
tan — a fellow-being that had come to his notice in a 
state of helpless suffering and need. Our neighbors 
are those whom we see and know, or whom, at 
least, we can see and know — those who, in the busi- 
ness of life, come within the range of our knowledge 
— these in preference to those beyond the range of 
our observation and knowledge. 

You are not to love those over the mountains and 
across the seas whom you have never seen or know^n, 
and never can, as you love yourself. This were, per- 
haps, impossible to human nature. It is your neigh- 
bor whom you know, or can know and see, that you 
are to love as yourself, and treat accordingly. Love 
demands nothing impossible. Attempting too much 
you would accomplish nothing. You know how 
leaven works — the leaven that is ^^to leaven the whole 
lump." It works from a living germ within, out 
and out, till it reaches the circumference. It skips 
no spaces — leaps no gulfs. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 39I 

Your love would not, I hope, shut its eyes against 
the want that stares you in the face, to open them 
beyond the ocean. 

And then, too, helping your neighbor thus, you will 
soon be able to know whether your benefactions are 
helping or hurting — whether you are making a mis- 
take and helping the deviPs poor instead of God's 
poor. 

But, in any case, large sums would indeed be 
needed. There are many poor. ^ About one-fourth of 
the world's population are paupers. And the condi- 
tion of some of them is distressing enough to touch 
the hardest heart. The following case is just this 
moment reported. A sewing woman in an Eastern 
state writes to a sister in the West:^ 'T am dying of 
destitution. My children are starving, husband dead, 
ceaseless toil takes all my strength, and that for a 
mere sustenance of life. It has blighted every hope 
of the future. O^ sister! is God dead? Has humanity 
left the earth? This life is too long for the misery 
that is in it. Why am I kept alive with my joy 
blotted out? Why the sinless ones doomed to this 
lingering death? But for them I would kill myself. 
* "^ Sixteen hours a day to get sufficient to keep 

1. In 1880 there were largely more than a million of children 
in the U. S. under the age of fifteen — their ages ranging from five 
to fifteen — working to support themselves and families, instead 
of being in school. And what does such a fact signify?— See 
Arena for April, 'go. 

2. Statesman for June, '90. 



392 THE New religion. 

this miserable life. I die of want. ' ' And God only 
knows how many of such and similar cases in this 
great Christian city. 

But if all cannot be helped many can be, and this 
fact the Christian must recognize. If we suppose 
that 5 per cent, of the families in this city consist of 
widows and orphans, and are in actual need of help, 
and this cannot be very far from the fact, there is one 
man in this same city, who could build a home worth 
^i,ooo for every one of these families, and settle upon 
it an annual income of ^450 a year, and yet have 
enough left to make himself and his family amply 
comfortable for the rest of life. Four hundred and 
fifty dollars a year would be all that the husband, 
were he living, and working as a common laborer, 
could earn during the year. One man then in this 
city could thus practically, as far as support is con- 
cerned, restore the husband to every such family, 
and put it into a comfortable home. Besides, this 
grand patrimony could run on and on, and bless suc- 
cessive generations. 

Six men in this country could be named who could 
endow every needy family in the United States with a 
little home worth $1000, and place to its credit ^1000, 
to be put at interest or drawn upon for imperative 
needs. 

One church in New York is worth ^150,000,000.^ 
I. See Fortwi, November, i88q. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 393 

The Presbyterians in Chicago hold ^300,000,000 
worth of property.^ 

There is property enough held by church communi- 
cants to banish cold and hunger and thirst and naked- 
ness from every family on earth, enough to put every 
sick sufferer upon a clean and comfortable bed in a 
comfortable home. Enough to take all children, too 
young to work, out of factories, and put them in 
schools, dressed in good clothes and with good shoes 
on their feet. 

So you perceive that there are ample means for 
helping the needy and enough left for building all 
needed and more permanent benevolences besides, 
if men would but consent to disburse it. 

There is destitution because the wealth of the world 
is not distributed. There is no scarcity, none what- 
ever, but the scarcity of love — the virtue of the second 
commandment. And the selfishness and avarice which 
hoards millions will infallibly curse its possessors. 
This is the judgment of history. It is marvelous that 
men do not see it. There is no surer way to damn a 
family than to damn it with wealth. 

A. But no one has a right to live alone for one's 
neighbors — not even for one's country nor one's age, 
for that matter. The ages to come have a claim upon 
the present age and it is the duty of the present to 
bequeath something to the future. We must have 
institutions that will live after us. You could invest 
your means with hope of more permanent results. 

I. Moderator's address before Pres. Gen. Assembly, 1890. 



394 THE NEW RELIGION. 

B. Yes, I could build a college or a church; but 
there would be no gilt-edged security that it would 
not after awhile be abandoned and pulled down, as 
they are at this moment pulling down the Chicago 
University — an institution built a few years ago by 
your prudent, far-seeing charity. 1 happen to know, 
myself, that not a few churches built by the sweat and 
blood of well meaning charity have been quite aban- 
doned. There are better things than colleges and 
churches in the form of piles of brick and mortar. 
Granite and marble are not the best contributions one 
age can make to another. There are ^ ^monuments 
more durable than brass." Bring in the reign of 
peace on earth and good will to men; bequeath the 
Christ-spirit and the Christ-life to all lands, and 
establish a genuine Christian socialism in the earth 
and the future will take care of itself. The human 
soul and goodness and God — -these survive. 

Besides, Would you allow your children to suffer 
to provide for the comfort and well-being of your 
grandchildren? Are you so much interested in the 
unborn that you cannot help those poor sufferers on 
Water street? If you love not your brother whom 
you have seen, how can you so love the brother 
whom you have not seen and never can see? 

There is enough within your reach — enough of sin 
and suffering to exhaust all your means, enough of 
crime and degradation to fill your hands and heart. 
If you are a Christian, 3^ou have been commissioned to 
help save men, following in foot-steps of the Master. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 395 

The pass-port into the higher nature is through the 
lower nature, and the humble ministers of love as 
they appear in sympathy and companionship — in the 
divided loaf and cup of cold water, will climb into the 
higher nature more quickly and awake its best powers 
more certainly, than all the ex-cathedra deliverances 
of pope and priest-hood. 

Jesus evidently thought so, since he did not seek to 
ground his cause in chartered institutions or enshrine 
it in marble. He, as no other reformer ever did, 
had faith and hope in the power of a good example 
as the light of the world — as the power that should 
win men and cause them to glorify the Father in 
heaven. 

At any rate, of one thing I am certain. While I know 
I have been spending my means, as you think indis- 
creetly — frittering them away upon short-lived chari- 
ties, yet I have not, in my way, served God for nought. 
I have seen not a few lifted out of squalor and dire 
need. I have seen them made glad and grateful. I 
have seen them taking on new strength, and starting 
forward again on life's journey with renewed reso- 
lution and hope. In placing one unfortunate father 
upon his feet, you sometimes save a whole family 
to virtue. In waking a poor mother's love and grati- 
tude you kindle the fires of love in a whole family of 
sympathetic children, and possibly the magic touches 
of your unselfish love will unlock forces that will avail 
to redeem a whole community, and bring in a dis- 
pensation of peace and good will that will widen with 



396 THE NEW RELIGION. 

the coming years and bring multitudes of prodigals 
back to the Father's house. I have helped a few. I 
have heard them thank God for human sympathy and 
human help. Instinctively they were borne upward. 
Irresistibly they were swept into the holy of holies, 
and I have proved, O, how often, thank God, that it is 
indeed '^more blessed to give than to receive.'* I 
have been feeding on the manna of heaven. I have 
been drinking the nectar of the gods. 

I have no large fortune left; but my heart and my 
hand are still open, and the blessed light that sheds 
its radiance upon my daily life is already throwing its 
beams across the borders, and I am content. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

The Ministry of Love. 

A newsboy took the Sixth Avenue elevated car at 
Park Place at noon on Thanksgiving day, and, slid- 
ing into one of the cross seats, fell asleep. At Grand 
street two young women got on and took seats oppo- 
site the lad. His feet were bare, and his hat had 
fallen off. Presently the young girl leaned over 
and placed her muff under the little fellow's head. 
An old gentleman in the next seat smiled at the act, 
and without saying anything held out a quarter with 
a nod toward the boy. The girl hesitated for a 
moment and then reached for it. The next man just 
as silently offered a dime, a woman across the aisle 
held out some pennies, and before she knew it the 
girl, with flaming cheeks, had collected money from 
every passenger in that end of the car. She quickly 
slid the amount into the sleeping boy's pocket, 
removed the muff from under his head without arous- 
ing him, and got off at Twenty-third street, including 
all the passengers in a pretty little inclination of the 
head that seemed full of thanks and a common secret.^ 
Love begets love. Goodness is catching. Love and 

I, Union Sig., Jan., '89. 



398 THE NEW RELIGION. 

goodness put a charm upon men from which they 
cannot escape. 

We have already had occasion to note the passion 
of love as a human sensibility and to consider it as 
concreted in the life of Jesus. In conclusion we note 
it as the Spirit of God, and powerful to save from sin. 

Love has been the theme of the poet in all ages, 
and literature abounds with beautiful illustrations of 
its power to sway the will and reform the life. 

Love is a passion native to the human soul. He is 
most depraved who can most habitually and effectually 
resist its power. It is interesting to notice its out- 
cropping in all the walks of life. Cyrus, having 
entered Armenia and taken the king and all his family 
captive, ordered them before him. ^^Arminius/' 
said he, ^^go, you are free, for you are sensible of 
your error; and what will you give me if I restore 
your wife to you?" ^^All that I am able." ^^And 
what if I restore your children?" ^^All that I am 
able." ^^And you, Tigranes," turning to the son, 
^'what will you do to save your wife from servitude?" 
'^I would lay down my own life," said the love-bound 
Tigranes. *^Let each have his own again," said 
Cyrus, and departed. 

Then one spoke of his clemency, another of his 
valor, another of his beauty and grace of person. 
**Do you think him handsome?" said Tigranes to his 
young wife. ^^Really," said she, ^T did not look at 
him." ^^At whom did you look?" ^^At him who offered 
to lay down his life for nip," 



THE CHRIST MISSION, 399 

The story of Damon and Pythias has been often 
told. Though somewhat legendary it is true to human 
nature. Pythias was condemned to death by the 
wanton tyrant, Dionysius. He wanted to return 
home and arrange matters for his family. Damon 
proposes to take his place, under sentence of death, 
and allow Pythias to return to his family with the 
understanding that he should make haste and return 
if possible before the day of execution and relieve his 
good friend Damon. He returns just in time to 
save Damon's life, and you have noticed how such 
love and fidelity affected the tyrant — affected him 
more powerfully than the great Plato could when 
presenting to him his ideal ^'Republic." *^My good 
fellows, you are both free.'' The cold iron of his 
nature yielded as it had never done before — *^You are 
both free. I should like to be a sharer with you in 
that love which makes such generous conduct 
possible." 

The same strain of nobilit}^ ran in the blood of the 
men that made Rome master of the world. 

Regulus being defeated and taken prisoner by the 
Carthagenians, was deputed to the Roman Senate as 
the one man who could most influence that body. 
*'Go," said Carthage, ^^and secure the terms we pro- 
pose and you are free. But fail and you perish as 
the greatest enemy of the Carthagenians." Regulus 
went on parole to Rome, and, entering the Senate, he 
insisted that the terms were dishonorable to his coun- 
try and prevented their acceptance. Bound by his 



400 THE NEW RELIGION. 

honor he returns to Carthage to be put to death as he 
knew he would be, with horrible torture. Most noble 
Regulus, what charm was upon thee! What the 
secret of such nobility! Whence such inflexible devo- 
tion to the ideal right! The world delights to honor 
^hee! Love is the mother ot heroism. 

Let the fire fiend sweep over Chicago, or the angry 
flood overwhelm and destroy Johnstown, or the 
earthquake bury Charleston, or the plague smite the 
Southland, and what do we see! We say God was in 
the proffered bounty because love was in it. 

An humble, obscure peasant woman of my intimate 
acquaintance goes down into a protracted struggle 
with the powers of darkness and a deep sense oi sin 
before God, but she emerges into a life of light and 
love to become a ^ ^burning and shining light. '* She 
marries, and though poor, she adopts successively 
five orphan children, graded in age, a la mode, and 
trains them up with a mother's tenderness and solicitude 
in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Not by 
might nor by power, but by my spirit — the divine 
passion. Such are the possibilities of ordinary 
human nature under the reign of love. No other 
passion can be enlisted for purposes so holy; none so 
strong to achieve the ransom of the soul from sin and 
bear it away into all helpfulness. 

A young woman in Scotland left her home and 
^^went to the bad." Her mother sought her far and 
wide in vain. Chancing one day to see her mother's 
picture, she sank down overwhelmed with a sense of 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 4OI 

sin. She was the prodigal daughter. The memory 
of her mother's love swept over her, and, like her 
older brother, she came to herself and resolved to 
abandon her sinful life and return to her mother — for 
she knew that she would forgive her. She was saved 
— by my Spirit, saith the Lord. 

The most orthodox Nicenist will concede that the 
intermediary suffering and sacrifice of the ^^Lamb of 
God" are available only on certain conditions. A man 
becomes a Christian by accepting Christ as his savior 
only, when the needful moral influences have reached 
him; and this is true whatever view of the atonement 
is adopted. 

Let us not doubt the potency of the cross to appeal 
to the heart and to stir the soul to its depths. Christ 
and him crucified was the theme of Paul's preaching 
throughout his great mission, as it must be that of 
every successful preacher of the Christian gospel. 
But Paul wrote the 13th chapter of ist Corinth- 
ians, *^If I have not charity I am as sounding brass, or 
a tinkling cymbal. A certain subjective moral con- 
dition is imperatively necessary to true happiness, 
whatever may be the involved conditions or the 
environment. It is not the sacrifice and death of the 
Lord Jesus Christ as such — but the engendered love — 
the love which such an exhibition of personal sym- 
pathy awakens in the soul, that saves men. During 
his life he appealed to the hearts of men, not so much 
by parading the fact that he was to be offered up as a 



402 THE NEW RELIGION. 

sacrifice to appease offended justice, as he did by 
other means. 

The fact is, it may be fairly questioned whether he 
ever alluded to such a denouement of his commission. 
The passages claimed and relied upon for setting up 
this view are ominously few in number and withal 
admit of a very different and more rational interpre- 
tation; nor does such interpretation detract from or 
weaken the power of his life to stir the soul to its 
depths and awaken the better nature. 

That the Heavenly Father must be propitiated; 
that the Lord Jesus must be offered up as bulls and 
goats are offered, and that blood can wash away sin, 
are gross conceptions that have come down to us from 
Paganism and old Judaism, and are becoming more 
and more repulsive to Christian thought. Nothing 
can be clearer from the evangelistic point of view than 
that love dominated the Heavenly Father in sending 
the only begotten Son, that love dominated the Son 
in the fulfillment of his mission, and that love must 
come to dominate the alien child and bring him back, 
prodigal-like, to the Heavenly Father, if he is to be 
saved. 

If his salvation is made to turn upon any specific 
objective means or conditions, it is inevitably certain, 
such is human nature, that he will soon come to trust 
too much to such means, and fall away into a formal 
and dead or half dead externalism. This tendenc}^ 
and this result is palpably evident in the worship of the 
cld Roman and Greek churches, and traces of it may 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 403 

be found even among the best forms of Protestant 
orthodox}^ In the literature and hymnology of the 
churches the ^^cross," and the ^ ^cleansing blood" are 
constantly paraded as the Christian's hope, and sine 
qua non. % % % 

"Then if thou bid'st me pray or go 

Unto the prison, I'U say no; 
Christ having paid, I nothing owe; 

For this is sure, the debt is dead 
By law, the bond is cancelled." 



-Robert Herrick. 



'It is the old cross still, 



On which the living one 
Did for man's sins atone. 

Old cross, on thee I lean. 

Old and yet ever new 
I glory still in you. 

Hallelujah! 
It shall stand forever." 

— Bonar. 

Poetic symbolism you say. Yes, but a symbolism 
which among the ignorant masses of the Greek and 
Roman churches has already prostituted Christian 
worship to the verge of fetichism. 

A consistent example, radiant with the graces which 
love engenders, is precisely what is most needed every- 
where in this alienated and misguided world. Few 
men will resist or care to resist the overtures of love. 
To capture men and bind them to you with cords of 



404 THE NFAV RELIGION. 

steel you must banish selfishness and make such 
common cause with them as love requires. 

The power of a pure love to sway the heart and 
rule the life is well known — nothing is better certified 
to our knowledge. It is the great factor of goodness; 
and goodness is the only hope. But goodness implies 
consent, reciprocity. God does not appear in human 
consciousness as a factor of personal goodness. He 
does not compel us to be good. Indeed, we know 
that we could not be compelled by any might or 
power to be good. Love comes and captures con- 
sent, cuts away selfishness, sweetens life, brings in 
peace and good-will — develops goodness. 

Love as manifested in the Heavenly Father, as 
seen in the blessed Lord Jesus Christ, as revealed in 
in the lives of the pure and good whose lives are the 
light of the world, this is the inspiration and the 
source of all goodness. 

"Love strong as death — nay stronger, 
Love mightier than the grave, 

Broad as the earth and longer 
Than ocean's widest wave: 

This is the love that sought us. 

This is the love that bought us, 

This is the love that brought us 
To gladdest day from night, 
From deepest shame to glory bright, 
From depths of death to life's fair height. 
From darkness to the joy of light." 

— Bonar, 



CHAPTER XXXVIL 

The Ministry of the Spirit. 

The universe has proceeded from a power which is 
not only an enduring power that makes for right- 
eousness, as Mathew Arnold has said, but a power 
which, with equal certainty, makes for paternal love 
and providence. 

If this postulate could not be maintained from 
nature, it is, at least, very clearly set forth by the 
Founder of the New Religion. 

Starting with this conception of the Divine Being, 
the most skeptical could hardly doubt that intercom- 
munication between the All Father and his children 
must in some way be not only possible, but frequent 
and easy; and this precisely is what Jesus assumed 
to be true. 

This thought of the Father's vigilant care over all 
his creatures pervades the teaching of the Founder 
of the Christian system. But how is this care mani- 
fested — how for the birds and for men? Not wholly 
by visible agencies, not in such a way as to dispense 
with the individual's activity, or to interfere with his 
autonom}^ He has made both birds and men with 
such adaptations to their environment, and endowed 
them with such capacities and instincts that, while 



4o6 THE NEW RELIGION. 

they remain obedient to the laws of their being, they 
will infallibly be fed and clothed. The divine provi- 
dence and sympathy extend to every form of life, 
and the law that governs all, it seems more and more 
plain, is characteristically the law of love. 

The part which we play in the drama of life is com- 
paratively small, and mostly visible, but the part 
played for us, though invisible, is great, and instantly 
and imperatively needful. 

Do you say we sow and reap, and supply our 
wants? Yes — but whence come the germ and the 
fostering influences out of which come the grain and 
the bread? Whence come tlie thousand beautiful 
adaptations of light and warmth and air and moisture 
which develop the germ — whence the appetite and 
taste that select and measure our food to us — whence 
the digestive fluids, the blood currents and heart- 
beats and oxygen that instantly sustain the manifold 
processes of nutrition? Who, sleeping or waking, 
runs the complex machinery of your life? Surrender- 
ing, as we so habitually do, to mere sense, we fail to 
apprehend the immanence and the reality of spirit 
existence and spirit power. 

All power is predicable, not of matter, which can 
neither move itself, nor stop itself when moved, but 
of spirit. And the fact brought out by the Son of 
Man, and the fact never to be forgotten, is, that this 
all-power spirit makes for paternal care and provi- 
dence, and is, or at least seeks to be, in constant 
rapport with the spirit of man. We hardly realize 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 407 

how closely we stand to great physical and spiritual 
forces — physical and spiritual, if such a distinction 
may yet be made. Our senses are so ^ ^cabined and 
cribbed," so dull and feeble, that our own world is 
really very small. We see wonders in suggestive 
outcrops, but only in outcrops. 

We strike the chords of some crude, heavy-going 
musical instrument — this has been our only privi- 
lege. We may, if we have an appreciative ear, detect 
intimations of fine melodies — hints of musical power 
and realization. The Cleremont of Fulton was a hint 
of the Great Eastern, and her five miles an hour a 
foregleam of a trip across the Atlantic in five days. 
Franklin's kite, evincing the most brilliant conception 
of that age, was a prophecy of annihilated space, and 
the construction of a whispering gallery 25,000 miles 
in circumference. Morse and Edison and others 
helping us, we have taken a long step into the hith- 
erto unseen, and the rifts in our material encasing 
have allowed us to catch other gleams that glint and 
flash from the realms of light. What in the way of 
spirit manifestation and revelation of power awaits 
the next step, and the next, and the next? 

We can see farther now and hear better. The 
improvement has been along the line of sense-per- 
ception, and immediately related to our higher nature. 
In the sphere of mere animal life we have hardly 
improved upon our ancestors of long ago. But in 
the domain of art, of science, of morals and religion 
we have improved. 



4o8 THE NEW RELIGION. 

^*The whole movement of history," says Rev. 
Joseph Parker, ^*in all that is vital and permanent, is 
a movement from the outward visible to the inward 
spiritual." I would put it differently. I would pre- 
fer to say, the movement is from within. Matter, 
organic and inorganic, is the mother condition of 
germinal life, and the processes of life are develop- 
mental — expansive — from within outward. But of 
the moveme7it^ there can be no doubt. Mr. Parker 
continues: ^'From the minuteness of microscopic 
by-laws, men have passed to a spiritual sense of moral 
distinctions. The great tables of b3^-laws have been 
taken down, because the spirit of order, of truth, has 
been given. What is true of law is equally true of 
institutionalism; its progress is from a crude outline 
toward completeness of purpose and critical accuracy 
of statement.''^ 

The thought of Mr. Parker will bear expansion. In 
the earlier stages of religious development the 
dependence upon material symbols is all but absolute. 

There have been, and there must have been, in all 
lands, offered sacrifices and burnt incense, altars and 
officiating priests, to give expression to instinctive 
religious wants, and the religious sense, because of a 
conscious dependence upon externalities in the wor- 
ship of God. Our knowledge of the Jewish people, 
their religion and worship, is more full and accurate 
than that of any other people, and may be considered 

I. Apostolic Life, 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 409 

representative. Thirty-four centuries ago Moses, versed 
in all the learning of the Egyptians — then the most 
highly cultivated people of the world, was delivering 
the law from Mt. Sinai, and organizing an elaborate 
system of worship. It was thoroughly external — ritual- 
istic. It consisted of sacrifices and ceremony. It 
required altars and incense and officiating priests — 
hecatombs of slaughtered victims. A visible angel of 
the Lord went before them to show them the way. 
All of which was provisional, educational, mediatorial, 
and designed to help them toward the spiritual, 
whether Moses so understood it or not. 

Five hundred years later the question was raised, 
''Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings 
and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord. 
Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken 
better than the fat of rams.'' i Sam. 15: 22. The 
thought of the old seer was a brilliant one, and opened 
up a new world. 

During the next one hundred years a great advance 
was made, and we hear the Psalmist, as God's mes- 
senger, crying out to his people, ''Hear O Israel, I 
will tak6 no bullock out of the house, nor he goat out 
ot thy field, for every beast of the forest is mine, and 
the cattle upon a thousand hills. I know all the fowls 
ot the mountains, and the wild beasts of the fields are 
mine. Will I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood 
o' goacs? Ojftr ttnto God thanksgiving and pay thy 
vows unto the Most High." Psa. 50: 7-14. A more 



4IO THE NEW RELIGION. 

spiritual worship is dawning upon the masters of 
thought in that early age. 

Three hundred years later, the question is raised, — 
'^Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow 
myself before the High God? Shall I come before 
him with burnt-offering — with calves of a year old? 
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rivers of 
oil? Shall I give my first born for my transgression — 
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He hath 
showed thee, O man, what is good, — and what doth 
the Lord require of thee but to do justly and to love 
mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.'' Micah 
6: 6. A great move forward certainly from Mt. 
Sinai. 

Amid the vast reverses that befell that highly 
favored, but unfortunate, people, the movement seems 
to have been somewhat retarded and the advance- 
ment toward a true conception of God and his wor- 
ship is less pronounced, but there was progress 
nevertheless. 

The religion of Micah had gone to the other 
extreme. It had become mere morality. The ideal 
divine government or kingdom of heaven had not 
come to light. Worship by means of slaughtered 
victims and shed blood was felt more and more to be 
deficient and imperfect, and Micah could see nothing 
in it. But there remained a conscious want of har- 
mony between the sinful soul and the ^^Moral Order.'' 

Six hundred years later the cry was heard in the 
Judean deserts — the voice of one crying in the wilder- 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 4II 

ness ^^make straight the way of the Lord" — a voice 
which with impassioned fervor called men to repent- 
ance as a preparation for the kingdom of heaven. 

A long stride has been made during these 1500 
years from Mount Sinai to the banks of the Jordan. 
The passage from the external to the internal has 
been effected, and a new era in religion dawns. The 
light already gilds the tops of the mountains. 

The Samaritan woman at the well of Jacob, repre- 
senting the average worshiper, raises this question — 
the last in the category of materialism — (9?/r fathers 
worshiped in this mountain, but the Jews say that 
in Jerusalem is the place to worship — where is the 
place to worship? '^The fulness of the times had come" 
for the announcement of a pure spiritual worship — 
for independence of the soul upon shrine and symbol. 
The goal is reached. ^ ''Woman, believe me,'' said 
the Son of God; ^*the time cometh, and now is, when 
neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem shall ye 
worship the Father. The true worshiper, worships 
in spirit and in truth. God is a spirit, and they that 
worship him must worship in spirit and in truth." 
Jno. 4: 21-24. 

There is wide complaint among the churches, 
especially in the older communities, that the public 
worship of God is neglected. And as a matter of 
fact there are very man}^ who care little for the ritual 
and ceremony of public worship. Several factors no 
doubt unite in producing this result. But, it can 
hardly be doubted; that many have ceased to feel the 



412 THE NEW RELIGION. 

need of such external appliances to aid them in the 
worship of God. They are approaching a degree of 
intelligence and spirituality which enables them to 
apprehend God as a spirit, to be worshiped as such, 
in spirit and in truth. 

With advancing life, if one use and cultivate his 
powers properly, the spiritual becomes more and more 
immanent and realistic. Any proper use and cultiva- 
tion of one's powers must, of course, include his 
moral nature. Mr. Fisher and the authors of the 
Unseen Universe have convinced us, that what we see 
of the physical universe, is little more than an infini- 
tesimal part of it.^ But what we care just now to 
study is, not the boundless extension of the physical, — 
its latitude and longitude, — but the immanence of the 
spiritual, in its relation to human possibilities. 

Within this field of inquiry there cannot be a doubt 
that Jesus, the Christ and Son of God, is the world's 
greatest teacher. If indeed he be the Son of God, as 
represented by his biographers, this were an a priori 
expectation. No one could doubt his capabilities as 
a teacher of things unknown to ordinary men, and, as 
a matter of fact, few, I think, will question the value 
of his contributions to our knowledge of spirit and 
spirit existence. 

The movement from the material to the spiritual 
noticed by Mr. Parker, is due more to him than to all 
philosophers and scholars besides. If true, and we 

J. See Atlantic Monthly^ 1889. 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 413 

have no good reason for questioning the historical fact, 
those were strange and significant rifts in the over- 
arching material — that voice from heaven — that scene 
on the mount of transfiguration, the touch of healing, 
the resurrection, the ascension. Nothing like them 
in the world's history — flashes from the world of 
light streaming away across the bosom of night, into 
the dark and distant horizon. ' 

^^I have many things to say to you," he said to his 
disciples, ^ 'but ye cannot bear them now.'' He was 
constantly making revelations to his disciples which 
on account of their gross preconceptions — their ina- 
bility to rise out of the organic material, they did not 
and could not grasp, but, going beyond all these, he 
could scarcely restrain himself from other revelations, 
yet more difficult to comprehend and wonderful. ^'I 
have many things to say," but ^'ye cannot bear them 
now." ^'Howbeit when the spirit of truth is come he 
shall guide you into all truth." Jno. 16:12. 

Blessed spirit of truth, come. Thou art our great 
hope. Come and guide us into all truth! 

To educate men and thus lift them into higher 
spheres of life and light, is a slow and difficult work. 
The pillar of cloud and fire stood over the altar for 
hundreds of years, before even the favorite children 
of God, and this, too, under the inspired teaching of 
seer and prophet, could get away from visible symbols 
and worship God with any intelligence. What heca- 
tombs of slaughtered victims — ' 'firstlings of the flock" 
^— did it require to make the people realise that ''God 



414 THE NEW RELIGION. 

is of purer eyes than to look upon sin," and how did 
the Son of God labor and wait to impart a true con- 
ception of his purpose and mission to the world? 

But as the movement from the material to the spir- 
itual was forward from Moses to Micah, and from 
Micah to John, under this teacher ^'come from God" 
it has been forward from John to the present da}^ 
Grant, if you please, the movement has not been 
steadily forward. Christianity suffered so much in its 
conflict with paganism — came so near being utterly 
absorbed by it, that the pillar of cloud and fire again 
stood still for a thousand years. But thank God, the 
day dawned on this long, dark night, the spirit of 
truth guiding into truth — and the Renaissance opened 
the world to freer thinking. Christ with his blessed 
gospel came to the rescue, and we find ourselves at an 
immense remove from the Baptist preacher in Judea 
— *^He that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater 
than he." Much that was difficult at the dawn of 
Christianity is easy now. The impossible then, has 
been achieved. With faith as a grain of mustard 
seed, the sycamine tree has been plucked up — the 
mountain removed into the sea, and we have almost 
ceased saying with Nicodemus, ^^how can these things 
be?" 

The Son of Man sought to open up a vast realm 
hitherto unknown to seer or prophet. The teaching 
of the sermon on the mount assumes that there is such 
a realm. There is a kingdom in which the poor in 
spirit, and those who mourn, and those who hunger 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 4x5 

and thirst after righteousness, and the merciful, and 
the pure in heart are blessed. It is a kingdom that 
Cometh not with observation. How he sought to im- 
part a true conception of this kingdom! To this 
kingdom how he sought instantly and anxiously to 
bear away the thought and the hope of the world! 
In his own experience the mere physical and sensu- 
ous sink more and more out of sight. The spiritual 
becomes more and more immanent and obvious. On 
the low ground of the visible, death ends all; but 
upon the high ground upon which he stood, and upon 
which he would have the world stand, death does not 
end all. In his thought death is little more than an 
incident, soon to become a mere reminiscence — a half- 
forgotten memory. ^^Touch me not," said he to Mary, 
after the resurrection. ^'I am quitting this sensuous 
state of being; touch me not, I ascend to my Father." 
The pulses of his life were already beating across the 
chasm. Unseen realities already outweigh all that is 
visible. This was his assumption from the first; and 
to this height he would lift men. 

Shall we say that the scene on the mount of trans- 
figuration was a revelation of the personnel of the 
future state of being, seen in Moses and Elias, one 
now dead 1500 and the other 800 years? 

Shall we say that the resurrection of Jesus demon- 
strates the fact, so earnestly sought for through the 
ages, that ^^If a man die he shall \\w^ again." Why 
not? 

Shall we say tha,t the resurrected Son of Man 



4l6 • THE NEW RELIGION. 

lingered for forty days as one treading the outmost 
limits of the visible, ready to pass out of these time 
and sense relations, and, both by his manner of life 
and by his teaching, sought in ways wonderful, but 
adapted to their purpose, to lift the human soul out of 
and above its mere sensuous experience, and to take it 
with him into the inexplicate realities upon which he 
is entering in advance? Did he thus seek to span the 
chasm between man and his maker. Is he the ladder 
which Jacob in the olden time saw in his vision rest- 
ing upon the earth and reaching to heaven — the angels 
passing and repassing? 

Shall we regard his ascension as the complement of 
his ministry and mediatorial mission as the world's 
Savior, in reference to which he said, ^^And I, if I be 
lifted up, will draw all men unto me?'' 

If we should answer all these questions in the 
affirmative we should probably not be far from the 
truth. 

But if these things be so what is the extent and 
fullness of these spirit manifestations as compared 
with all that the world had ever known or imagined? 
Whatever else may be true it cannot be doubted that 
this wonderful Son of Man, though confessedly but 
imperfectly understood even yet, is the world's great 
teacher in regard to matters spiritual. 

Having prepared his disciples as best he could for the 
coming of a larger spirituallife, he makes known to them 
the fact that a fuller and more direct manifestation 
of the spirit i? at hand. Behold, I gend the promi§^ 



THE CHRIST MISSION, 417 

of the Father upon you — even the spirit which pro- 
ceedeth from the Father — Tarry ye in Jerusalem until 
endued with power from on high. 

And now he breaks to them the sad intelligence 
that, in order to do this, he must depart out of this 
world — intelligence which filled them with sorrow. 
^^If I go not away the Spirit — ho Parakletos — will not 
come.'* You so habitually lean upon the visible — - 
upon sense, it will be impossible for you to realize 
your capacities as spirits independent of the material 
organism while I remain among you. But, if I go 
away, I will send him unto you. Then, on thinking 
of me you will be able to realize that, though unseen, 
I am present with you, and you shall be able to live 
over again and perpetuate in larger development the 
experience we have had together, and our intercourse 
thenceforth will be more constant and intimate and 
less embarrassed than it could be if I were to remain 
in the flesh with you. In the body gravity interferes 
— locomotion is hindered. You must scatter abroad. 
In the body it would be difficult — impossible for me 
to follow you and be with you. In the body we step 
forward only on and on. In the spirit we can return 
to the past — to the sermon on the mount — to Bethany 
and Jerusalem — to the mount of transfiguration — to 
Gethsemane and the Cross, and so, returning with me 
in spirit, you will listen again to my words, and you 
will get their meaning as you never got it before — 
you will come to understand my mission and work 
whigh you did not, ' at the time, half understand, and 



41 8 THE NEW RELIGION. 

you will begin to realize, as you can never otherwise 
do, what the Kingdom of Heaven really is. '^I tell 
you the truth, it is expedient that I go away." In 
this way only can the necessary progress in this move- 
ment toward the spiritual be accomplished. 

Withdrawing from their sight and hearing he took 
away their dependence upon his visible presence and 
threw them upon their memories and meditations. 
He turned them from the outward to the inward — 
from the material to the spiritual. The evidence 
which completed the demonstration of his Messiah- 
ship and the truth of what he had taught had now 
been furnished — furnished in his arrest and trial, his 
condemnation, his crucifixion, his resurrection, all of 
which he had foretold. In the light of this evidence 
the past is to be re-read. 

Some of us yet lean heavily upon the visible and 
sensuous. We want a visible Christ. We think if 
he were but present as he was to the apostles, how 
easy it would be to understand, to accept and follow 
him; and we can hardly see why the benevolent 
Father did not give to every age its visible Christ and 
to our own as well. 

But as it was expedient that he then should with- 
draw himself from sight, it is expedient still that he 
remain unseen. The tendency to localize and enshrine 
the object of worship is yet very strong, even among 
Christians. It is seen most among the more ignorant 
and less developed classes. You see it in the Roman 
|nd Greek churches. If a little critical you will detect 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 4ig 

it also in Protestant churches, especially in the 
dedicatory services of churches and temples. It is 
expedient for j^'^^ that I go away. 

When the Holy Spirit — to pneuma agion — has come 
he shall glorify me, for he shall receive of mine and 
shall show them unto you. Jno. i6: 14. 

The relations which the Holy Spirit that proceedeth 
from the Father sustains to the Messiah are close and 
intimate. The circumstances changed, the minds of 
men better prepared, the development more complete, 
the divine spirit will reproduce and emphasize the 
teachings and the life of the Son of God and make 
them more real — more powerful to save. 

Besides, much of this teaching was but a planting 
in the soil of humanity. After all, the disciples had 
only caught hints and glints of the truth. The oak 
was yet in the acorn — its potencies not half compre- 
hended. As the acorn needs the fostering light, 
germinal truth also needs the fostering light of the 
spirit that proceedeth from the Father. ^^He shall 
take the things of mine and show them unto you and 
shall bring all things to remembrance whatsoever I 
have said." As the truth opens up to you more and 
more under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, this 
doctrine — my former teaching — and that revelation 
will come trooping back into memory and stand forth 
in living light. 

When the Comforter — no Pa7'akletos\ the Holy 
Spirit — to pneuma agion\ whom the Father will send 
in my name, is come, he will reprove or convict the 



420 THE NEW RELIGION. 

world — elexi ton kosmon\ of sin — peri amartias, and of 
righteousness — pert dikaiosunes^^xidi of judgment — peri 
kriseos. Jno. i6: 7, 8. 

How shall he do this? 

In the process of time, in the light of accumulating 
truth the hearts of men will be touched by the Spirit 
of truth, not all at once, nor as to all men in the 
present age, but in the ages to come, and they will 
be convinced of the truth of my pretensions. Poster- 
ity will reverse the judgment of the Sanhedrim. The 
Holy Spirit of truth will lay the sin upon those who 
condemned me. It will vindicate my character, and 
the Tightness of my cause; it will vindicate me as the 
Son of God sent on a special mission to the world, 
which now, to seeming, is ended because I go to the 
Father. And this vindication made, the prince of 
this world stands condemned. All that hinder the 
truth and the right must share in the condemnation 
which awaits iniquity and sin. When the Holy Spirit, 
which proceedeth from the Father, is come, he will 
convict the world of sin, of righteousness and of 
judgment. 

We have noticed in former pages how men, under 
the influence of inordinate passion, have fallen into 
error. The Son of God here lifts the veil and makes 
known to them how they may avoid error and be led 
into truth. The spirit of truth and candor must 
come and possess them. They must covet it as God's 
best gift. They must with earnest prayer and yearn- 
ing put themselves in rapport with it. The differ- 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 42I 

ence between truth and error will become more evi- 
dent. The truth will become more precious. It will 
appear where it had never been seen before. It will 
be found in all religions — in all philosophies. If the 
Holy Spirit shall so reveal the divine presence as to 
subordinate disturbing passions and thus clear the 
sky of reason, it will save from error — it will help the 
discovery of truth. 

When the spirit of truth — to Pneuma Aletheias — is 
to come he will guide you into all truth and show you 
things to come. Jno. i6; 13. 

There are things to come which we very much want 
to know, but which we cannot find out with all the 
picks and hammers of our speculative thinking. 
What mean mesmeric and clairvoyant phenomena? 
What various healing phenomena, conditioned, shall 
we say, on certain mental states? What the teaching 
of that hour of prayer in solitude, when the soul, 
seeking to strip itself of things earthly, essays to 
climb up to heaven? What the significance of 
thwarted purposes and well-meant endeavors? What 
the meaning of life cut down in youth and prime, of 
the wide inequality of human conditions, of gross and 
sickening wrongs and injustice seemingly unpunished? 
What the meaning of the sobs and heart-breaks at the 
grave of our dead, of blighted hopes and wide-spread 
suffering? — We know but in part. Sorrow breaks 
upon joy and joy upon sorrow — the night and the day 
of the soul — this play and counter play, what of it? 
Spirit-ward there are things to come. 



422 THE NEW RELIGION. 

At Pentecost they, for the first time, found it possi 
ble to comprehend in any clear light the scheme of 
human redemption — to realize the great salvation. 
When the spirit of truth had come, the beautiful life 
they had witnessed in the Son of Man, his death and 
passion, his dying prayer, his resurrection and forty 
days of sojourn among them, during which it seemed 
he would almost lift them bodily into the spirit 
world, and finally his ascension, conspire — tout ensem- 
ble — to sweep them outward into broader fields and 
higher life — into his own kingdom, which is not of 
this world. — They began to see ^ ^things to come." 

The Christian is favored with peculiar manifesta- 
tions of spirit influence. He has come into recipro- 
cal relations with the beloved Son and with the 
Father, and within these relations he becomes the 
subject of other experiences — other charisms. 

Once appetitive indulgence, money, power, fame, 
display — these filled the horoscope, these charmed 
and swayed the life. But the shadow of death hung 
over them. In his new relation to the Father, love, 
gratitude, truth, right, mercy, sympathy, the ideal 
perfections of an ideal Savior — these make up the 
enchanting camera-lucida. Appetitive indulgence and 
fleeting pleasures -are subordinate — thought is wont 
to range above them. These eternal verities are his, 
and no shadow of death hangs over them. 

But what of those who have not been favored with 
the special teaching of the Messiah? 

It is very plain from our point of view that they 



THE CHRIST MISSION. 423 

have suffered loss. The spirit which proceedeth from 
the Father could not bring to their remembrance 
things they had never heard or known, or teach them 
what they were not prepared to learn. 

But many good things had been done, many noble 
precepts formulated, many life-inspiring and life-sav- 
ing things had been said and done by the Old Masters 
of thought — the Messiahs of pagan and heathen lands. 
Their love for humanity, the sacrifices they made, the 
truth they discovered, the blessings they conferred, 
must not be lost upon the world. They shall not be. 
The Hol}^ Spirit will reproduce them for the ages, 
write them in the memories and burn them into the 
hearts of the successive generations. They shall be 
conserved and shall conspire to aid in the uplift and 
salvation of the world. Thou blessed Holy Spirit, 
thou Light of the World, show all peoples the things 
that have been and ^'things to come/^ 



Finis. 



INDEX. 



Analysis, Psychological, needed 17 

Appetite, Uses of 37 

Asceticism 148 

Asceticism, a form of selfishness 156 

Avarice 43 

Birth, The new = 317 

Character, Transformation of rapid 317 

Christ, The Q.ij et seq. 

Christ, The, A revelation ; 266 

Christ Character, The 203 

Christ Teaching, The, difficulty of understanding. 275 

Christian Canon, The , 212 

Christian, The, a Supplementary Christ 358 

Christ Mission, The, outlined 259 

Christ Mission, The, set forth by the Evangelists. 259 
Christ Mission, The, as understood by himself.. 261 

Christianity, Contents of 210 

Christianity, As understood by J. S. Mill 352 

'^Conversion," Cases of 215 

''Conversion," Peter 318 

"Conversion," Paul 320 

"Conversion," Justyn Martyr 323 



426 INDEX. 

^'Conversion/' Jerry McAuley 326 

'Conversion," Others 333 

Creeds, not changed by the Reformation 215 

Depravity, Different views of 11 

Depravity, Ethical difficulties, as stated by Dr. 

Wardlaw 13 

Depravity, Ethical desiderata. 15 

Design, as seen in nature 19 

Dialogue, on the duties and the privileges of the 

Christian 378 

Doctrine, The, Ministry of 275 

Education, More Greek than Christian 65 

Education, Course of study 67 

Error of Old Religions 168 

Evil, General considerations i 

' Evil, Compensations 4 

Evil, Exaggerated 2 

Evil for evil 277 

Faith, a belief 340 

Faith, a trust 345 

God, Service of 381 

Gospel, Powerless, why 385 

Heathens and the Holy Spirit 422 

Individual, The, in Christianity 364 

Inspiration, Plenary 191 

Intellect, The 57 

Intellect, The, Infirmity of 57 

Intention, not the rule of judgment 361 

Jesus, Evangelistic account of 217 

Jesus, Biographers of 205 



INDEX. 427 

Jesus, Genesis of miraculous 186 

Jesus, Sui Generis , 234 

Jesus an Exemplar 235 

Jesus a Philanthropist 246 

Jesus as a Philanthropist, compared with Moses. 252 

Jesus, Compared with Sakya Mouni 255 

Jesus, Compared with Socrates 249 

Jesus as a Teacher 239 

Jesus, His reliance upon example 354 

Judgment, The last 376 

Knowledge, Virtue of 120 

Life immortal, The 109 

Longevity 27 

LovCj The chief affection 80 

Love, Christian, levels things 387 

Love, Sexual, uses of 49 

Love, Sexual, abuses of 54 

Love, Sexual, has relation only to present state 

of being 55 

Man, The ideal and the real 7 

Man, of two natures 23 

Men, different orders of 187 

Ministry of doctrine, The, Peace 311 

Ministry of doctrine, The, Prayer 301 

Ministry of doctrine. The, Regeneration 295 

Ministry of doctrine. The, Repentance 285 

Ministry of Love, The 397 

Miracles 185, 193 

Miracles, Hume's argument 185 

l^orals, Egyptiaii cQ4e ^ ,.,.,,,,, ^ ,,..,,,,,,. , 12^ 



428 INDEX. 

Morals, The Brahmin code 127 

Morals, The Buddhist code 128 

Morals, other codes 130 

Nature, The lower 27 

Nature, The lower, how improved 32 

Organization, a ^^craze" 372 

Organization in religion 364 

Organization, danger of 371 

Optimism 5 

Parker, Rev. J 408 

Peace and good will 311 

Plato and Paul 202 

Prayer 301 

Property, desire for 41 

Property, uses of 42 

Property, a competency 43 

Property, passion for gratified in the present life . . 44 

Punishment, not reformatory 166 

Purpose of the Creator must be followed. ...... 19 

Quid credendum 340 to 345 

Quid fidendum 345 to 351 

Regeneration, nature and extent of 295 

Regeneration, law of 291 

Regeneration, necessity of 294 

Religions, The Old, their merits considered 117 

Religions, supernatural 181 

Religion, The New 203 

Religion among pagans and heathens 135 

Religion, Aryan 140 

Religion, Egyptian , , , , ,,..,,.,.,., 137 



INDEX. 



429 



Religion, Persian , 140 

Religion, progress of 408 

Repentance 285 

Repentance, stoicism in regard to 289 

Sensibilities, prevalence of 74 

Sensibilities, classification of 77 

Socialism, Christian 387 

Spirit, separate from matter loi 

Study, course of 67 

Supernatural, The 178 

Sympathy, want of in the Old Religions 169 

Sympathy, all men need 172 

Taste, uses of 37 

Treasure in Heaven 280 

Will, The 85 

Will, function of o , . . . 87 

Will, freedom of , 89 

Will, disorder of 97 

Will, weak and strong 96 

Woman, rights of 278 

Works, ministry of 352 

World-life, The, fulfills its destiny in the present 

state of being 109 

Yearning, the prophesy of gratification 112 




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